Succedaneum
She found it so fast it was as though it had been waiting for her. There, on the page after the one she’d been looking at that morning, two days after Mael had fallen from the Humpback Bridge, she found the missing child.
But not a son. And not a toddler.
A baby. A girl, taken from a hospital in the North Marches hours after her birth, while her mother was sleeping and the nurses were occupied with another, difficult birth in the very same building.
The hospital Sorrow had been born in. The night Sorrow had been born.
Her grandmother told her she’d been a miracle child, snatched from the jaws of death. She’d told her how she’d offered anything to the Graces if they’d bring her back. The story had warmed Sorrow as a child, this proof that someone had loved her enough to want her to stay. Her father couldn’t have made it clearer he didn’t love her, didn’t even like her. He never used her name, always “daughter”. An accusation. Or perhaps a question…
Sorrow stared down at the page, her vision swimming. It was a coincidence. It had to be.
But there was a chill in her bones, a deep, heavy pooling of dread in her stomach.
She had to find Charon.
She hurried from her room, ignoring Dain when she asked if Sorrow was all right as she passed. She left the small palace and began to run, the piece of paper gripped in her hand as she followed the covered walkways. She should have asked him where he was staying – wait, what had the woman, Deryn, told her? With Ambassador Mira. Charon was staying with her.
Sorrow saw two Rhyllian guards walking ahead of her and sped up, slowing when they turned at the sound of her feet pounding the gravel.
“Ambassador Mira’s quarters?” she panted. “I need to find them.”
The men looked between themselves, silently conferring, before one pointed towards a small palace, painted a soft green. “There.”
“Thank you,” Sorrow gasped, forgetting Rhyllians disliked the simple phrase and breaking into a run once more.
There was another guard outside, and he moved to block her path as she approached.
“I’m Sorrow Ventaxis,” she said as she drew up before him. “I understand the Rhannish vice chancellor is staying here. I need to see him, urgently.”
She wondered how she looked to him, still dressed in the pale blue gown she’d worn to the Naming ceremony. She could feel her hair had fallen loose from its knot atop her head as she’d run, knew her face would be flushed, her eyes wide and panicked.
The man gave her a once-over and, apparently deciding she wasn’t a threat, stood aside, and Sorrow entered the ambassador’s palace.
The layout of the ambassador’s palace seemed the same as the one she occupied, so she turned to the left and followed a short passageway down to where the rose parlour was in her own quarters. As she’d hoped, it was the same here, though instead of roses the walls were patterned with birds, vases of feathers instead of flowers, but the room was empty of the vice chancellor.
At the sound of her footsteps a butler appeared from a small door behind the bar area.
“Can I help?” he asked in Rhannish.
“Is Lord Day here?”
“Yes, miss. I believe he’s in his rooms. From the hallway, follow the corridor down; it’s the second door on the right.”
Sorrow nodded her thanks, turning back and heading to the room she’d been directed to, heart beating in time with her hurried footsteps.
She took a deep breath, and knocked on the door.
“Yes?” Charon called.
Sorrow went in.
As in the small palace, the room was a library, now adapted into a bedroom for Charon, so he could come and go as he pleased without needing to be carried up and down stairs. There was a low bed, and a small sitting area, and a screened part that Sorrow assumed was for bathing or dressing. But at that moment she didn’t care about the setup of the room. She didn’t care about anything but getting an answer to the question that was bubbling through her like poison.
Charon was sitting up on the bed, the chair parked beside it, his legs under a light blanket, a book in his hands. The window was open, birdsong and the low buzzing of bees drifting in through it, and the room smelled of the roses that grew outside. Charon frowned when he saw Sorrow, opening his mouth to speak.
Then he saw the piece of paper in her hand, crumpled and ragged.
Without saying a word, he swung himself off the bed and into his chair, rolling to meet her in the middle of the room. He met her gaze steadily, though she could see the fluttering of his pulse at his throat.
“Tell me…” Sorrow began, but didn’t know how to finish. “On the day I was born, a baby girl vanished from the hospital—”
“Sorrow…”
“No.” Her voice was high, still breathless from running. “Let me finish. A baby girl vanished the night I was born. And I was born with the cord around my neck, wasn’t I?” she asked as Charon lowered his head. “That’s the story. Grandmama revived me when the midwife froze. Whisked me out of the room to save me. And she did. I lived.”
Charon said nothing.
“Or did I die?” Sorrow said. “Rather, did the real Sorrow die? And my grandmother took me instead, to take her place. Is that why you didn’t want me to look at the reports? Not because it was a waste of time, but because of this?”
Still he didn’t speak, his eyes locked on hers, his mouth pressed together. On the wheels of his chair, Charon’s knuckles were white.
“I’m an imposter,” Sorrow said.
“No.” Charon spoke then. “You’re not an imposter.”
“So I’m wrong? This is a coincidence?”
“Sit down.”
“No.”
“Sorrow, please. Sit. If you fall I can’t catch you.”
If it hadn’t been for the fact her bones felt as though they were made of spun sugar, she would have remained standing to defy him. But she didn’t trust them to hold her for much longer, so she sat, collapsing into a chair covered in gold silk, as Charon moved opposite her.
“I want to hear it all. The whole truth.”
Charon gave a single, deep nod.
“I didn’t know until afterwards – that’s not an excuse,” he said. “But I want you to know it wasn’t a scheme. None of it was planned, by anyone. And by the time I found out it was too late to do anything without destroying the country. I was in hospital myself when it happened.” He gestured down at his legs. He would have been bed-bound, the bones in his legs shattered beyond repair when he dived after Mael.
Sorrow said nothing, waiting with a face like stone for him to continue.
“To the best of my knowledge, the infant I met when I returned to the Winter Palace almost a year later was Cerena and Harun’s child. I had no inkling until four years after that, when your grandmother told me.” He lapsed back into the old terms. “Harun had shown no interest in you at all, and your grandmother came to me. It must have weighed on her so heavily. She’d got into her head that Harun could sense you weren’t his, because he wouldn’t see you, wouldn’t hold you. I tried to reassure her that his disinterest was because of his grief … and then she confessed what she’d done.”
“She stole me.” Saying the words aloud did nothing to make them easier to bear.
“She took the baby – Harun and Cerena’s real daughter – from the room, but she was clearly beyond help. She said she didn’t know what to do; she kept walking and then she passed a room with a sleeping child in and it was done. She took her – you.”
He made it sound such a simple thing. Explained in just a few words the actions of a few moments. Sorrow shook her head, trying to clear the low buzzing there.
“What happened to the other baby?”
Something like shame, or regret, flickered over Charon’s face. “She hid her, in a cupboard.”
Sorrow choked, her hands rising to cover her mouth.
“She went back for her,” Charon said hastily. “Graces, Sorrow, she didn’t leave her there. She secreted her out, and into Cerena’s coffin. They’re buried together.”
He paused, and Sorrow closed her eyes. That poor baby. Her poor parents. Surely they’d raised the alarm? Surely they’d demanded to know where their daughter had gone?
“How did she keep it quiet?” she asked.
Charon understood what she meant. “Mael and Cerena had just died, the country was in shock. No one cared about a missing child, even one taken from the same hospital you were born in. The people were just grateful it wasn’t you.”
“But it was me,” Sorrow said, her eyes flying open to meet his.
He held her gaze for a moment, then looked away.
“Who are my real parents? Did she tell you that?”
Charon hesitated, clearly debating whether to answer or not. “A young couple, from the North Marches,” he said finally.
“Do they have other children? Do they still live there?”
“I don’t know. I never asked for more information than that. I didn’t want to know.”
“You didn’t want to know?” Sorrow couldn’t stay seated any more, launching to her feet and beginning to pace.
“Sorrow, listen to me. You were five years old when I found out. Five. You’d fallen asleep in my arms more times than I could count; my name was the third word you ever said. My own children doted on you, Irris couldn’t be kept from your side. Arran stood watch over you when you were ill. As far as I was concerned, you were Sorrow Ventaxis.”
“But I wasn’t!” Sorrow’s voice rose as hysteria gripped her. “I’m not.”
“What was I supposed to do?” Charon replied. “Cast you out? Tell Harun? Your grandmother would have been executed.”
“She wasn’t my grandmother!”
“She was in every way that counted.”
“She stole me! From innocent people. Stars, Charon, of anyone, how can you defend this?”
“I’m not defending it. I’m explaining it.”
Before he could say anything else there was a knock at the door.
Sorrow and Charon exchanged a brief glance, and Charon wheeled himself to the door.
Irris stood on the threshold.
“Is everything all right?” she asked Charon. “Sorrow?” She looked into the room. “What’s going on?”
“It’s fine. We’re fine,” Charon said. “Go and get ready for the ball.”
Irris looked at Sorrow, and it took every ounce of self-control she had to nod that she was all right.
“It’s just a disagreement,” she said, her voice shaking. “I’ll tell you later.”
Irris looked between the two of them, her disbelief evident in her frown and the set of her mouth. Then she shrugged, saying nothing else as she turned and left. Charon closed the door and then rolled to the window, closing that over too.
“Sorrow…” he said as he moved back to her.
“That’s not my name. That’s the name of the dead girl. I don’t know what my name is.”
“Your name is Sorrow,” Charon said.
“For it’s all I bring.” She turned to him. “That’s what she said, Cerena, isn’t it? Sorrow is all I bring. Stars, what if she knew? What if the last thing she knew was that I was a lie, that the daughter in her arms was a substitute? After all, my name is practically a prophecy.”
“Please, calm—”
“If you tell me to calm down I will scream.”
He held up his hands. “Sorrow, believe me, had I known at the time what your grandmother had done, I would have done something. Had you smuggled back to the hospital and returned to your … to those people. But as I said, you were five when she confided in me. Too late to undo what had been done without breaking Rhannon completely. The nation knew you as Sorrow Ventaxis, the last scion of the Ventaxis family. It was far too late to do anything other than make the best of it.”
“And my real parents. Do you suppose they made the best of it?”
Charon shook his head mutely.
Sorrow made her way back to her seat. “Who else knows?”
“No one. Your grandmother only told me. And I know you might not want to hear this now, but she loved you. As far as she was concerned you were her true granddaughter. She knew what she did was wrong, but I don’t believe she ever regretted it. And…” He paused. “You’re the true Ventaxis heir. You might not be a Ventaxis born, but you’re Ventaxis bred. You’ve been raised that way.”
“How can you condone this?” Sorrow said on a breath. “It’s your job to make sure that the laws of Rhannon are upheld. I’m not a Ventaxis. I can’t run for election any more.”
“It’s my job to make sure the needs of Rhannon are served before anything and anyone else. No individual is bigger than Rhannon; only Rhannon matters. I’ve told you that a thousand times,” Charon said. “You have to run. And you have to win. Or Rhannon will fall under Vespus’s control.”
“How is this any different to what Vespus is doing? I’m the same as Mael. Raised to be something I have no right to be.”
“It’s not the same. You have lived your whole life Rhannish, as Sorrow Ventaxis.”
“It wasn’t my life to live!” Sorrow said.
“It’s too late to think those thoughts, Sorrow. This can never come out.” Charon’s eyes were wide. “You can’t reveal this. Not now. Not ever.”
She knew they couldn’t. Especially not now, not with the Sons of Rhannon and their stirring up of hatred against the Ventaxises. It wouldn’t take much to ignite the fire they were kindling under the people of Rhannon, she’d seen that at her presentation. There was an undercurrent of hatred running through the heart of Rhannon. The people were already on edge. The slightest spark could cause an explosion that would devastate the land. Bad enough that after too many years of suffering and deprivation they were now playing witness to a fight for the chancellorship. Two Ventaxises battling for the role.
No. Not two.
Because she wasn’t a Ventaxis.
She didn’t know, still, whether he was – not for sure.
But she knew, without doubt, that she wasn’t.
The knowledge sank into her, and she doubled over, gasping for air.
She heard Charon move, felt his hand on her shoulder, and she wanted to shrug it off. He’d lied to her, almost her whole life. And yet he was all she had and she couldn’t push him away. Not then, at least.
The sobs were deep, coming from somewhere inside she hadn’t known existed. She’d never been someone who cried easily, or at all. As a child she’d raged and seethed when things didn’t go her way, but never cried. When she’d fallen over or hurt herself, she’d remained stiff and silent, biting her tongue to keep from crying. Even when her grandmother had died – not her grandmother – she’d felt broken, bereft and empty, but she hadn’t cried. In a country once caged by grief, not crying had seemed an act of rebellion. Yet now all she could do was cry, convulsing as weeping engulfed her body, her mouth open in a silent moan as tears fell. Her hands were fists, beating softly at her knees as she wept a lifetime of tears, until the well was dry and she was hollowed out, empty of everything.
All the while Charon kept his hand on her shoulder. He didn’t rub it, or offer any words. He was Charon, her all-but-father, as stoic and steady as he’d always been. There, always there.
She wanted so much to be angry with him. But her rage had leaked out too, washed away by her tears.
She looked up, her throat aching from crying, her face puffy and tender from the salt water that had flooded it.
“My girl,” Charon said.
Then she moved, allowing herself to be held by him. Needing it.
When she finally pulled away, embarrassed, she scrubbed at her eyes furiously.
Her voice, when she spoke, was a crow’s song, croaking and harsh. “What do I do?”
“What you’ve been doing.”
“And if I win?”
“Then I’ll be a happy man because Rhannon will finally have the chancellor she deserves.” Charon said. “You’re Sorrow Ventaxis. It’s who you were raised to be. Nothing has changed.”
He was wrong. Everything had changed.
She had more questions. More she wanted to know. But her tongue was lead in her mouth, thick and heavy. She rose to her feet, forcing him to roll his chair back to look up at her.
“I’d better get ready for the ball,” she said.
“Sorrow…”
“I’m … I need time,” she said. “Please.”
Charon nodded.
He wheeled ahead of her to the door, turning his chair to block her path.
“Don’t tell anyone,” he said. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but you can’t. Not Luvian, not Irris. No one. Please, trust me.”
Trust him… How could she, when he’d lied to her for most of her life?
“I’m here for you,” he said. “Whenever you need.”
She believed him in that, at least. He held up a hand and she took it, reaching for the door handle with the other. Then she left him, left the ambassador’s palace, walking back to the small palace in a daze. When she got there she couldn’t recall if she’d met anyone on her journey back, or spoken. She heard voices from the parlour but ignored them, climbing the stairs to her room. Mercifully Dain had gone, and Luvian was still out. Sorrow closed the door to her bedroom and lay on the bed, eyes open but unseeing.
Somewhere out there her real parents might be living their lives. She might have siblings, cousins, grandparents. They might even have been at the presentation, she realized. Or at the bridge… The young woman with the baby; that could be a sister, a niece or nephew. Suddenly every Rhannish face she’d seen looked a little like hers, a parade of them behind her eyes, face after face with her lips, her eyes, her chin. She’d always thought she looked like Harun, but she was no more his than Mael probably was.
And what a dark thing that was. To have to fight him, knowing she deserved it no more than he did. Less, because he at least still thought he was a Ventaxis. Stars, with the way things were going maybe he was really Mael Ventaxis.
She lay there, unmoving, long into the afternoon, until the sun dipped, bathing the room in a soft gold light.
She heard Luvian’s return, heard the shuffle to his steps that told her he was maybe a little drunk. She heard him go into his room, heard drawers opening, heard the splashing of water as he washed. He whistled softly, his pitch perfect.
Still she didn’t move, lying on the bed as though she was a corpse, as dead as the girl whose place she’d taken.
“Sorrow?” Luvian knocked on the door and opened it without waiting. “Sorrow, is your head—”
He cursed when he saw her, rushing to her side, pressing his hand to her forehead.
“Sorrow? Graces, you’re hot. Shall I send for Irris?”
“No.” Her voice was still hoarse. “I’m fine.”
She made to sit up, and Luvian sat on her bed, watching her with naked concern.
“Sorrow, I don’t think—”
“I said I’m fine. What time is it?”
“Seven chimes.”
“I’d better get ready.”
“For the ball?” Luvian asked. “Do you think that’s a good idea? Look, you stay here; I’ll send someone to fetch Irris, and she can sit with you until you feel better.”
“It’s a headache.” She could hear the flat tone to her voice, saw the worry in his eyes. “Give me half an hour.”
“I’ll stay with you, I don’t mind.”
“Half an hour,” she said again.
Luvian paused, as though he might argue, and then nodded, rising silently and leaving her. He closed her door, and she heard him moving about, but he wasn’t whistling any more.
Sorrow swung her legs off the bed and crossed to the wardrobe, every step as heavy as though she was moving through honey. She took out the dress Irris had assigned and changed into it, letting her old outfit fall to the floor like a skin she’d shed.
The dress was sleeveless, gossamer-thin gold silk, the fabric pretending at sheerness. The neckline was a slash that ran from shoulder to shoulder, the slim, fluted skirt grazing the floor. She was more covered than she had been on either of the previous nights, yet the colour of the dress, so close to her skin tone, and the way it clung to her form before flaring over her hips, made her seem, at first glance, so much more exposed. It was beautiful – a weapon of a dress; Ines’s work was exceptional – and Sorrow had been looking forward to wearing it, knowing it would draw the eye. A gown fit for a future chancellor.
Not a pretender.
If she’d had anything else to wear, she would have buried the dress at the bottom of her trunk and wished never to see it again.
She walked to the mirror, ignoring her body from the neck down, and pulled her hair back into a severe chignon. She lined her eyes, drawing the wings into savage points, coated her lashes in black paint and daubed her mouth with scarlet lipstick, once again creating a mask to hide behind. When it was in place, she opened her bedroom door.
“Ready,” she said.
Luvian’s eyes were wide, almost frightened, as he took in the woman who stood before him. For a moment it was as though he hadn’t recognized her.
Sorrow knew how he felt.