Rodvard drew her hand toward him, but she pulled it away; Demadé Slair said; “I crave your pardon, demoiselle; truly. I did not know you were so royalist. . . . Then Brunivar fell. You heard of it?”
Rodvard said; “I have had little news, buried in Charalkis; only that there were troubles.”
“Attainted of treasons, and sent to the throat-cutter. The case was pressed by the Duke of Aggermans, very violent against him, no one altogether knows why.”
“I think I could find a reason.”
“No doubt, with your stone. But d’you see the situation that left? With Brunivar gone, there’s no regent-apparent in the case of Her Majesty’s death, which may fall any day. I think it was you who sent word to the Center that Florestan expected the regency in his room. Very like he would have had it, too, but for the tax matter; but the regency question furnishing an excuse the nobles summoned a general assembly of all the estates, and once they were met, they began to consider everything.”
“And the revolt?”
“Oh, it began in the west—at Veierelden, with some of the army and not with our party at all. Brunivar’s people joined, setting forward the name of Prince Pavinius, and how he was wrongfully set aside from the succession, and had long since abandoned being an Amorosian. They even persuaded the old man to come out of Mayern and raise his standard. Most of the nobles have gone there with what troops there are, but I don’t know how much fighting there has been. Neither side’s very anxious for war. The important thing is that the great assembly was left in session with the nobles out of it, and you can see what that means.”
“Not quite. Enlighten me.”
“Why our party in the majority and Mathurin in control of everything.”
Rodvard turned a face of utter astonishment. “Mathurin? How—What—? I might have thought Dr. Remigorius—”