A Queen in Hiding by Sarah Kozloff

Author:Sarah Kozloff
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

28

Cascada

Matwyck leaned forward in his box in the Peacock Theater, his arm on the railing, his eyes drinking in the spectacle, his ears catching every word.

So this is what pity feels like? What? Are these real tears on my cheeks? It provides a certain ennobling glow!

Plays gave Matwyck a rare taste of the emotional palette that people around him claimed to experience. Watching from his special “Regent’s Box,” Matwyck not only recognized the character’s sentiments; he came close to actually experiencing them. He attended most productions several times, finding that familiarity with the story enhanced rather than detracted from his delight. This was the third time he had seen The Maiden’s Plight.

Its dramatic action stirred him. He responded especially to the middle of Act Two, when the mother fainted from bad news (poor soul, taxed beyond what she could bear) and the end of Act Three, when the maiden’s brother swore to avenge her (Yes! I would do that too!), and the climax when the woebegone heroine had sunk to her knees and rent her dress in anguish (oh, the picture of innocence persecuted).

“She should rip off that dress—it’s so-oo out of fashion,” commented Lady Dinista.

“Shut up!” Matwyck hissed at her, annoyed that she had interrupted his trance.

He turned back to the stage, where the dashing hero—so what if his belly hung low, he had a great voice that throbbed with feeling—now vowed to give up his throne for her.

Is this selflessness? Does love actually inspire selflessness?

Matwyck had become a devotee of the theater. Because Cascada was a magnet for all the artists in the land he’d heard concerts by court musicians and watched performances by the Royal Dancers. But it was the plays at the Aqueduct and the Peacock that had caught his fancy with their fencing, twirling silks, tension-filled stories, rousing music, and firecrackers set off at the finale. For the space of a few hours his heart beat faster with concern and suspense. Better still, he knew that all the other spectators shared his feelings. At the theater he felt most fully alive and almost … normal.

Matwyck always found it deflating to leave the magic of the theater and return to real life. Especially tonight when he was obliged to host a late-night supper party. His new chamberlaine pulled it off quite well, but then it wasn’t a grand event, merely a token engagement celebration for Lady Dinista and Lord Retzel’s second son. Matwyck rejoiced in getting Dinista—that grasping schemer!—out of Cascada. The Retzel family should be able to afford to keep her in the height of fashion.

Due to the queen’s prolonged absence the custom that stewards serve no more than one ten-year term had, naturally, been suspended. In the years Cressa had been gone Matwyck had consolidated his hold over the Western Duchies, the army, and the court. As Lord Regent and Lord Steward he dominated Weirandale.

Last night’s banquet had been part of his ongoing campaign to keep the nobles from getting restless. They appreciated that

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