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"What's an anima marriage?" the Maw Walker said, and Theotar spat out his tea.
"My dear!" He dabbed his mouth with a piece of shirt--it made an excellent napkin, if nothing else. When the Maw Walker asked if she could discuss something over tea, the mind of course went to her dismal performance at the Ember Court. Perhaps the proper cut of one's trousers, though how a walking corpse could find a suitable tailor baffled the brain. Possibly some way to apologize to Draven, what with that fuss over the robot with the orange paint (in which Theotar had no hand, he would swear it on his afterlife, no matter how much of a hand he contributed). But, no. No, she could never do anything so sensible.
Theotar might have been staring.
"What?" the Maw Walker said.
Theotar shook his finger. (Gubbins, bless, mopped the table with another piece of shirt.) "My dear, you have no concept of social delicacy! Such language! Oh, imagine if you said such a thing during Court!"
"You say 'anima' all the time. Is marriage illegal here?"
"Surely one who makes her living in the summoning of unholy terrors--" He motioned his cup at the Maw Walker's demon, who was probably not actually named Fred, despite the Maw Walker's insistence. "--surely you should understand the power words carry when placed side by side."
"So I should say it during Court."
"I am going to throw you in the Maw." Theotar sipped his tea and shook his head. "An--oh, dear--an anima marriage is a terrible state. A lie for all to see! Imagine, if you would, two people, apparently happy, but with a terrible and shared secret."
"Murder?"
Theotar chuckled. "Nothing so bloody."
"Tax fraud?"
"What exactly were you before you became undead, my dear? Author of some terrible penny dreadful?"
"Tax attorney. Vincent, Vincent, and Prime."
Theotar shivered. No wonder she went into the business of demons.
"An anima marriage," he said, refilling his cup, "is one in which two people--upstanding, quite fine people--make a display of, mm, amory. To, ah. Hide illicit truths."
"Oh, like you and the Countess. How is Lizzie?"
Pleasant company or no, he was truly going to fling her into the Maw. Bodily. Fred, too, the eerie blueberry.
"Where, exactly, did you hear the phrase, my dear?" Theotar set aside his cup. Too much mushroom tea did awful things to the nerves (unless it was not the tea at all).
"Erm." The Maw Walker looked away. "Dredger stuff."
Gubbins and Tubbins paused in their duties. Theotar peered. "What are you doing to the poor dredgers?"
"His Royal Darkness told me to pretend to be one. At Court. Not the Ember Court. I think he wants intelligence, but all I ever hear is bitchy gossip."
"Which is why your performance at Court still requires my hand. Gossip is the intelligence of nobility."
"Then what I heard was the least intelligent intelligence ever to grace a party."
Theotar snorted, and laughed into his hands. This was why he took tea with the Maw Walker. Coarse, sloppy, and prone to maniacal cackling she might be, but she made him laugh. "Ah, my dear. Goodness, you haven't even touched your cup!"
The Maw Walker went quiet. She tipped her head. "Why don't you and His Royal Darkness just tell people? Come out?"
"Come out of what, exactly? The shadows?"
"We usually say the summoning portal, but yeah. I'm sure Lizzie and her wife would help. Not that I know who her wife is. She's really stubborn about that stuff."
"You don't know stubbornness until you've met the Countess." Theotar took up his cup, but only held it. "Princes have princesses. There's no such thing as a duke consort."
"So invent it."
"Such things might happen in your world, but in the Courts of Revendreth? With so many still loyal to Denathrius, and our own standing as tenuous as it is?" Theotar shook his head. "Mad I may be, but I'm not stupid."
Perhaps not the right thing to say, given the way the Maw Walker folded her arms. She stared until he looked at his tea, and she took a drawing of an orc from the pouch on her belt.
"Her name's Agohn. I don't get home to Undercity much these days, but when I do, she's still there. I'm amazed she hasn't gone back to Orgrimmar, as little as we see each other, but she says she likes the atmosphere. Our anniversary is next month."
Theotar took the picture. A scar cut across Agohn's face behind her round spectacles, a dexter bent, like a heraldic shield. The vellum had turned soft with age, but the picture's ink and delicate watercolour washes remained.
"That is your world, my dear." Theotar gave back the picture. "Your tea is cold! Here, let me pour you a fresh cup."
#
Given time and rest and enough food and tea, Renathal's ribs could no longer grate carrots. Theotar ran his fingers across them, tucked against Renathal's chest. He found a welt from their earlier games--played on a bed, thank you very much--and stroked it until Renathal growled.
"Am I not allowed to sleep?"
"What am I to do while you sleep eternity away?" Theotar said.
"Given you're the one who made me sleepy, I don't see how that's my concern."
Theotar nipped him. Renathal snorted and pulled him closer, deeper into the safety of his embrace. Theotar tucked his head under Renathal's chin. In the dark, in the privacy of their little cell, he could speak.
"I had tea with the Maw Walker today."
"Hmm? Is she still traipsing off the edge of the world?"
"Of course she is, the silly thing." The dredgers had a running tally of the number of times they rescued the woman from some tree branch or outcropping. There was a betting pool as well. So far, Theotar had won six weeks straight. "Did you know she has a wife?"
"Hmm, no, I didn't. Not venthyr, I expect. Not openly."
"An orc. And she was a tax attorney. I knew she frightened me for a reason."
Renathal laughed and kissed Theotar's head. "I thought it was the maniacal laughter and the screams of, 'Come get me, bitches!' that frightened you."
"No, those I rather like." Still, Theotar sighed. Renathal moved enough to look at him.
"What is it, my love?"
Theotar melted. He always did, no matter how many times Renathal said such things. He kissed him, and kissed him again, before he said, "She knows about us. The Countess said something."
"Really. Have I got to give Lizzie a talking-to?"
"My dear, I just got you back from one impossibly cruel fate."
Renathal laughed. "Excellent point."
"The Maw Walker said--well." Theotar shook his head. "It doesn't matter."
"Tell me."
Tell him. Of course. Always. Theotar took a breath, a moment to choose his words. "Her world is so different. No Courts. No gossip. Hardly even manners!" He clutched Renathal. "But she has her wife. Agohn, her name is. An orc. They live together in a city, and no-one thinks anything of it. No threats of finding sinstones, or shunning from Court."
"Or risk of losing what loyalists we have."
"Just so."
Renathal rubbed his chin atop Theotar's head, as he did when he wanted to think. Theotar pressed into it, enough to give permission to their silence.
Minutes passed, warm and dark. Theotar inched closer, and a bit closer again. Renathal tightened his fingers on his back.
"I don't care what your sinstone says," he said. "You were redeemed, as thoroughly as anyone."
"Yet we've seen how much that means. Good souls sent to the Maw. Evil ones made venthyr."
"You are not your sins, my love."
"But without them, I'd be somewhere else."
"And I'd be alone."
Theotar pressed his lips shut. Alone. Nowhere, in life or death, would he be alone, given what his sinstone said. Such arrogance. Such vicious pride. A blight upon his people.
Blight thrived in the Ember Ward.
"What is it?" Renathal said, drawing his hand over Theotar's hair, which had to be in a state.
"You would care what my stone says if you knew."
"I hear the Ember Ward speaking, not you."
Theotar drew back. "How would you know? You've never seen my stone."
"You never spoke like this before your time there."
Damn Renathal sometimes. "It doesn't make me wrong."
Renathal kissed his forehead. "It doesn't make you right, either."
#
For once, the Maw Walker acted nearly like a proper courtier.
Theotar sat with his tea and his parasol, watching to prevent, say, another foul-mouthed clapping game with Cudgelface. Really, there was something very wrong inside the woman's head, and from Theotar, that meant something.
"Are we acting like something other than a toddler full of coffee today?" The Accuser sat next to him with her own tea and parasol. "Oh, dear. Why is she speaking with Lady Mina? That dreadful bitch."
Theotar chuckled. "I'm sure she'll re-enact the whole conversation tonight for our amuse---"
The Maw Walker punched Lady Mina and marched for the stairs into Sinfall. Fred followed, floating behind her parasol.
"So much for Court," the Accuser said, and sipped her tea.
"Please excuse me," Theotar said as he stood. Renathal rushed to Lady Mina. Theotar found the Maw Walker huddled in a shadowy corner behind the mirror, her face against her knees.
Theotar knelt beside her. "What happened, my dear?"
The Maw Walker bared her teeth. "How do you do it?"
"I'm sorry?"
"How do you tolerate that kind of treatment? I let slip I've got a wife back home, and that--that---"
"Bitch?"
"--Blight-ravaged maggot asked if Agohn's name would be spelled out on my sinstone, or just implied."
"Oh, my dear." Theotar squeezed her hand. "Oh, my dear. Revendreth is an old-fashioned society---"
"It's barbaric!"
"Many of our people call your world barbaric."
"You're not exactly making me want to stick around."
Theotar sighed. He hugged her. Terrifying or not, she was little more than a child, at least compared to him. "I would like to meet Agohn, you know. Does she enjoy tea?"
The Maw Walker raked her sleeve across her nose. "She collects moulds, spores, and fungus."
"Excellent! Oh, I shall have to make her my mushroom tea. We'll have so much to talk about!"
The Maw Walker smiled, though it faded. "I think I want to stay here until Court's over."
"Do you want me to stay with you?"
She shook her head. "Thanks."
Theotar patted her hand and went back to the party. Lady Mina sat in the shade with Renathal, who fussed over her jaw. Anima misted about her skin. Renathal traced it back into place. Theotar adjusted his parasol and went to make apologies.
"Lady Mina! I'm so terribly sorry. I'm afraid our mortal friend has a, ah, a slight temper."
"She's got more than a temper! Really, Renathal, why do you keep that thing around? It was a pleasant enough toy in the beginning, but we've had our fun. It ought to be put down."
"You'd risk having her here forever?" Renathal frowned once more over Lady Mina's jaw. "There we are. Good as new."
"Better than new," Theotar said. "She did you a favour."
"Hmph. You have to wonder what her husband sees in her."
Theotar went still. A few people paused in their conversations, but chatter overlaid the music from a string quartet.
Renathal stood and bowed to Lady Mina, and turned to Theotar. "Would you care to dance, my love?"
Theotar's knees turned to water, but he caught himself, and again when Renathal bowed and kissed his hand. Only music filled the air. Renathal cast Lady Mina a look as he drew Theotar aside. He got shorter. Theotar blinked, and realised he was floating.
"My prince," he said, but took Renathal's hand and gripped his shoulder, then cupped the side of his neck. Renathal smiled and led him in a waltz Theotar hardly felt beyond the anima pounding in his chest and wrists.
"No need to look at me like I've gone mad," Renathal murmured. He slid his hand from Theotar's waist to his back to draw him closer. "I lost my head for you aeons ago. It's nothing new."
"But--but---"
"This is a rebellion, is it not?"
"There may not be enough of us left to rebel after this, my prince."
To which Renathal kissed him. In front of everyone, while they waltzed on air.
"Blimey," one of the drudgers said.
"Finally," the Accuser said, and went back to her tea.
For once, the light did not burn. Theotar bit his lip and rested his head against Renathal's chest, beneath his chin, as he did when they were alone. It was only a matter of time before someone found his sinstone and read it for all to hear, Renathal included. For the moment, though, he would dance.
The song ended. Renathal kissed him and drew him to the ground. Theotar gripped his arm, breathless, even as Renathal turned to the assembled Court and beamed.
"Thank you all for attending our most unusual gathering of the Ember Court! I'm afraid my consort and I must take our leave, but do enjoy the grounds and the company, if you so wish."
He bowed to Lady Mina and pulled Theotar down the stairs.
The Maw Walker sat in her corner, looking at her picture of Agohn. Renathal knelt before her. She looked up.
"Your Royal Da--Highness. I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over me---"
"She had it coming, my friend." He held out his hand. "May I?"
The Maw Walker held out the picture. Theotar crouched with Renathal for another look. Agohn looked kind, clever, perhaps a little mad herself, though one could never trust fact through an artist's brush. Truth, perhaps, but not fact.
"She's lovely," Renathal said.
The Maw Walker nodded. "I was going for a walk one night, and I tripped over her peeing in the woods. She nearly cut my head off. We've been together ever since."
Theotar laughed. "I would expect nothing less of you, my dear."
"Don't worry about Mina," Renathal said. "She has been quite thoroughly silenced."
The Maw Walker narrowed her eyes. "There was violence, and you didn't let me help?"
Theotar and Renathal laughed. They looked at each other.
"A bit of dancing," Renathal said. "We left them stunned."
"I thought you couldn't do that. Too dangerous."
"Yes, well. Revendreth is changing." Renathal looked at Theotar, his smile lighting the embers in his eyes. "We shall have to see how it handles one more change."
"Blightcaller's balls, you two. Get a room."
Only when safe in the petit maison's cool shadows did Theotar sit in his armchair and stare at nothing. Surely his sinstone was safe, buried deep below his parlour in the Ember Ward, and warded against discovery. Denathrius had his loyalists, though, and few knew more of vengeance than venthyr. Renathal hung a kettle over the hearth and sat next to him.
"I'm sorry. I know you had misgivings, but it needed to be done. We can't lose our only real weapon in this fight, especially now we know what she left behind for our sakes."
Theotar shook his head. "I should tell you. About my stone."
"You haven't got---"
"I have." Theotar cast a fireball at the kettle. Steam shot from its spout. "This is going to require tea."
Renathal, dear thing he was, made the tea, and even bitched the pot. Theotar held his cup between his hands.
"Alros the Faithless," he said.
"My love?"
"My name. In life. Alros the Faithless. Plague of Oaths, Breaker of Vows, He Who Steals Away. Dawn's Shame, the Wretch of Exodar and the Inconstant One. He who stole husbands from wives, fathers from children, with glee and pride, never looking back."
He glanced at Renathal, who watched him, perhaps a bit puzzled. Theotar sipped his tea.
"He who danced upon marriage beds, and broke families from their moorings. Cast from Argus, shamed and shameful, only to find his end in a wife's vengeance. I told you once I knew enough men to keep me from Bastion. Only, I didn't tell you they were married. Or that I sought them out as a game."
"Oh." Renathal looked Theotar up and down. "No wonder you're so skilled at--well."
"You can imagine how the ladies of the Court would react if they knew such a creature lurked near their husbands. Think of what Lady Mina would say if she caught me anywhere near Valad."
"You can't stand Valad. He's a stuffy oaf with a bloody stamp collection."
"Yes, but that isn't the point. One can hardly organise Court from a position of scandal."
Renathal smiled, a soft sliver that lit his anima from within. It left him pink and white. "You could. After all, what's a consort without a little scandal to keep people interested?"
"You really don't mind?"
Renathal motioned with his fingers until Theotar took his hand. Renathal kissed his thumb. "As I said, you were redeemed. I've never doubted you, my beautiful, faithful Theotar."
"Oh, my dear."
"Besides, you could teach the ladies a thing or two about making their husbands happy."
Theotar nodded. Truth was truth, after all. "You're certain all will be well."
"In times such as these, will anything be well?"
Which was as good a point as any.
"We really ought to send Lizzie a message," Theotar said. "She and the Stonewright will have our heads."
"Oh. I hadn't thought of that." Renathal narrowed his eyes and sipped his tea. "I hear Maldraxxus is lovely."
Theotar laughed.
#
Lady Mina did not appear at the next session of the Ember Court. Valad did, alas, stamp collection in tow, as did any number of guests whom Theotar had not seen attend other sessions--including the Stonewright. From her position on the Countess's arm, she shot him a look, but most people simply treated them as a curiosity.
"My love, she's juggling your tea set," Renathal said in Theotar's ear. Theotar squeaked and looked up to find the Maw Walker with his teapot balanced on her face and all four cups in the air. He rushed to the rescue.
At least the guests were happy. Even the two from Bastion were laughing, and they returned the Maw Walker's theatrical bow.
"For my next trick," she said, and Bogdan clapped his hand over her mouth. Next to Theotar, Renathal sighed and shook his head.
"She's hopeless, isn't she?"
"Perhaps we ought to start listing her as entertainment."
Renathal chuckled and kissed Theotar's head, to the gaping shock of only one or two. "Perhaps so," he said. "Perhaps so."
Still, and Theotar nestled against Renathal, her presence had been good for something. More than good, in fact. He accepted a kiss, and went to find a safer spot for his porcelain.