The Real Barenziah, Part VI                                     Anonymous                                                       naughty                                                                                            )	   6  #        5      The Real  Barenziah  Part VI           "You dance on the edge of a volcano, child," Drelliane scolded, as Barenziah admired the emerald ring her lover had given her to celebrate their one month anniversary.   "How so? We make one another happy. We harm no one. Symmachus bade me to be discriminate and discreet. Who better could I choose? And we've been most discreet. He treats me as a daughter in public." Tiber Septim's nightly visits were made through a secret passage.   "He slavers over you like a dog his dinner. Have you not noticed the coolness of the Empress and her son toward you?"   Barenziah shrugged. Even before she and Septim had become lovers she'd had no more from his family than bare civility. Threadbare civility. "What matter? It is Tiber who holds power."   "It is his son who holds the future. Do not hold his mother up to public scorn, I beg you."   "Can I help it if that dry stick of a woman cannot hold her husband's interest even in conversation at dinner?"   "Have less to say in public. That is all I ask. She matters little, save that her children love her, and you do not want them as enemies. Tiber Septim has not long to live. I mean," Drelliane amended quickly, at Barenziah's scowl, "Humans are all short-lived. Temporary, as we elves say. They come and go as the seasons do, but the families of the powerful live on for a time. You must be a family friend if you would see lasting profit from your relationship. Ah, how can I make you truly see, you who are so young and human-bred as well! If you take care you and Mournhold are like to live to see the fall of Septim's dynasty, if indeed he has founded one, as you have seen its rise. It is the way of human history. They ebb and flow like the tides. Their cities and even their empires bloom like spring flowers, only to wither and die in the summer sun."   Barenziah just laughed. She knew that rumors abounded about her and Tiber Septim. She enjoyed the attention for all save the Empress and her son seemed captivated by her. Bards sang of her dark beauty and her charming ways. She was in fashion and in love and if it was temporary, well, what was not? She was happy for the first time she could remember, each day filled with joy and pleasure, and the nights yet better.   "What is wrong with me?" Barenziah lamented. "Look, not one of my skirts fit? What's become of my waist? Am I getting fat?" Barenziah regarded her thin arms and legs and her undeniably thickened waist in the mirror with displeasure.    Drelliane shrugged. "You appear to be with child, young as you are. Constant pairing with a human has brought you early to fertility. I see no choice but for you to speak with him about it. You are in his power. It would be best, I think, for you to go directly to Mournhold if he will agree, and bear the child there."   "Alone?" Barenziah placed her hands on her swollen belly, tears forming in her eyes. Everything in her yearned to share the fruit of her love with her lover. "He'll ne'er agree to that. He won't be parted from me now. You'll see."   Drelliane shook her gray head. Although she said no more, a look of sympathy and sorrow had replaced her usual cool scorn.   That night Barenziah told Tiber Septim of it when he came to her.   "With child?" He looked shocked. Stunned. "You're sure of it? I was told elves do not bear so young."   Barenziah summoned a smile. "How can I be sure? I've never -- "   "I'll fetch my healer."   The healer, a high elf of middle years, confirmed that Barenziah was indeed pregnant and that such a thing had never before been known to happen. It was a testimony to His Excellency's potency, the healer said sycophantically. Tiber Septim snarled at him. "This must not be," he said. "Undo it."   "Sire," the healer gaped at him. "I cannot--."   "Of course you can," he snapped. "I command you do so."   Barenziah, wide-eyed with sudden terror, sat up in the bed. "No!" she screamed. "No! What are you saying?"   "My dear child," Tiber Septim sat down beside her with his winning smile. "I'm so sorry. Truly. But this cannot be. Your child could be a threat to my son and his sons. I will put it no more plainly than that."   "The child I bear is your child!" she wailed.   "No. It's but a possibility, a might be, not yet gifted with a soul or quickened into life. I will not have it so." He gave the healer another hard stare and the elf began to tremble.   "It is her child. Children are few among elves. No woman conceives more than four and that is very rare. Two is the allotted number. Some bear none, some only one. If I take this one from her, she may not conceive again."   "You told me she would not bear to me. I've little faith in your prognostications."   Barenziah scrambled naked from her bed, and ran for the door, not knowing where she was going, only that she could not stay. She never reached the door for blackness took her.   Barenziah awoke to pain and emptiness. Drelliane was there to soothe the pain and clean the blood that pooled between her legs, but there was nothing to fill the emptiness. Tiber Septim sent gifts and flowers, and came for short visits, always well attended. Barenziah received these visits with pleasure, but he came no more at night nor did she wish for him. After a week, when she was physically recovered, it was announced that Symmachus had requested she come to Mournhold earlier than planned, and that she would leave forthwith. She was given a splendid retinue, a wardrobe befitting a queen and a ceremonial departure from the gates of Imperial City. 