killed two of the miners by boiling them alive with their own blood.”
“I see” was all Lady Portinari said.
Her expression did not change. In fact, Galina could not discern even the slightest emotional reaction. Was Lady Portinari truly so poised that nothing visibly unsettled her? Or did she simply not care? Some mothers did not like to acknowledge any faults in their sons and would grow angry if any were brought to light. Galina suddenly wondered if she’d made a terrible mistake in coming there. But she was unsure how to break off now without making things worse, so she plunged on.
“Sebastian came to me soon after the mission in a state of great distress. He was… unkempt, which as you know is very unlike him, and it was clear he had not slept in some time. His actions troubled him greatly, but he was attempting to… console himself with the commander’s assurance that he had handled the situation perfectly. And well… I could sense he was looking to me for affirmation…”
Lady Portinari slowly stood and walked over to Galina. Her expression did not change, but she took Galina’s hands, which Galina had not realized she had been wringing, and held them gently but firmly.
“Speak, child. You are safe here.”
Galina hoped that was so. Clearly it was too late to turn back now.
“He asked me if… Sebastian asked me… if he was a bad person.” Galina vividly recalled his haunted expression, and was surprised to find her eyes filling with tears. “H-he was suffering so, my lady, that I… I could not find it in my heart to condemn his actions, despite the suffering he had inflicted on those poor miners.”
“Ah, I understand now.”
Lady Portinari guided Galina over to the sofa. Galina wasn’t sure what her future mother-in-law understood, but she allowed herself to be pulled down until they were sitting side by side, their knees almost touching. Lady Portinari took out a lace handkerchief and handed it to Galina.
“Thank you, my lady.” Galina dabbed at her eyes.
“Selecting you for Sebastian’s wife was perhaps one of the wisest choices I have ever made. Be at ease, my child, because you have done exactly the right thing. Condemning Sebastian in that moment would have accomplished nothing except drive a wedge between the two of you. And he needs you. Surely you know that.”
Galina nodded.
Lady Portinari continued. “I cannot say if it is the commander specifically or the military as a whole that brings such a troubling influence on our beloved Sebastian. His father was so profoundly affected by his own service to the empire that he forbade Sebastian from enlisting. And perhaps he was more right than I realized.”
Lady Portinari was silent for a moment, her eyes trailing away, possibly distracted by some memory of her deceased husband. Then she turned back to Galina, her expression firm.
“Regardless, I feel certain that if the two of us work in concert, we can at least soften the hard lessons he is being forced to learn. In the end, that is a woman’s job, after all. To act as a counterbalance to man’s darker inclinations. Do you understand?”
The tension in Galina’s face eased and a cold calm settled over her. “Yes, my lady.”
What she understood was that she had not found an ally here. She was on her own.
39
Sonya and Jorge followed Blaine and his blue-painted, mud-haired Uaine through the widening valley for several days. The sky remained a sodden gray, but the temperature grew warmer, and the rough yellow grass and pines were replaced by lush green meadows dotted with white and purple flowers, and the occasional clusters of maple or oak. Birds flew overhead, filling the air with their song, and from the tall grass came the buzz of insects. Sonya had become so accustomed to the silence of the tundra that she found this new cacophony of noise both thrilling and a little overwhelming to her sensitive ears.
In stark contrast to their surroundings, the majority of the Uaine were a quiet and grim-faced lot, keeping to themselves and only occasionally muttering to each other in their rolling, guttural speech. The sole exception was Blaine, who seemed to relish Sonya and Jorge’s company, and chatted intermittently in his broken and at times nearly incomprehensible accent about the weather, the landscape, and various plants and animals around them.
“How did you learn to speak Aureumian?” Sonya asked after listening to what she was fairly certain was a description of what this valley would look