Alliances Offered, Part Sixteen

"You should consider marriage, Your Majesty," said Dante Alighieri, and Tavros sighed. He needed assistance and support; instead, he received more demands. 

Nobody should wish to be king. It should fall to the person who draws the unlucky stick. Which I suppose is me, at this point. "You have suggestions, I presume?" asked Tavros, regarding the famed bard flatly across the wooden table where he was trying to study Vigo's map of the kingdom and its travails and loyalties. He needed to know this, rather more than he needed a wife to help cement his rule.

"Not as many as I might wish," Dante admitted, spreading his hands reluctantly. "There is some difficulty in determining who survived the approach of the dark army and the solari hunters."

Tavros sighed. "Do you have any suggestions at all, or is this advice of yours more in the nature of 'You need to be married and producing heirs, but I know not with whom'? Because if that's all you need, put Ruin on the throne."

The bard hesitated. "You have, I think, a very strong possibility in the young lady Bouvier, though such an alliance is less advantageous now that her father is once again in your service. Her lady, Tabitha Andiras, is also of noble birth and well-established... and I believe her aunt corresponds with your mother. And, of course, there is always the possibility that you could marry this so-called Warbear Queen, and settle--"

"What?" Tavros stopped himself with his claws halfway to Dante's throat. "No," he said. "Are you mad? I need to marry someone who will work with me, not against me."

Dante Alighieri had gone pale. "Of course, your majesty." 

"Leave me," Tavros said abruptly. "Now." 

The bard hesitated for a brief moment, then pushed his chair back and stood. 

"I will find a noble bride," Tavros said, managing not to grind his fangs together by an act of will. "I will do as the Kingdom requires. But I will not compromise us in a short-sighted quest for immediate stability."

Dante was still standing there. 

"Get out."

Dante went.

Tavros took a deep breath, and then another, and then another. He made himself remain still in his chair until the rage inside him had passed, and his head was clear again. Dante meant to provoke me, he concluded. The poet -- and likely Vigo the Whisperer as well -- felt that they needed a royal marriage, and heirs soon after. They would only have suggested a marriage with the Solari Hunter Jenny as a prod to get him to accede to something more acceptable. And the gods alone knew what sorts of pressures they might be bringing to bear on any likely noble daughters... and there were still some around, no few of them here in Caristhium.

I could still ask Martini to murder them both, he thought. The elvish assassin would likely do it just for fun, and ultimately the kingdom might even be better for it... or else it might be a disastrous mistake. And it wasn't as if they were wrong, exactly. He didn't intend to have anybody executed just because their good advice was unwelcome.

Damn it. Caught again. He needed to talk to the likeliest candidates, but before that he needed to decide just how much of this he was willing to put up with.