Prelude to Troubles

Vere Swayvil, for all his natural charm, did not have many close friends. There are none left who will speak in his defense, for most harbor the silent belief that he somehow deserved his fate. Knowing that anything I write here will certainly someday be read, I offer a small insight into his character, that he is not remembered solely as an irresponsible decadent womanzier, whose folly brought about an avalanche of tyranny, betrayal, and death from which we have still not recovered. My sense of justice demands it.

The most commonly cited proof of Vere's villainy is his womanizing and his infidelity to his wife, particularly by all those who were secretly in love with the Queen. The truth is Sive was never a good match for Vere, nor he for her. But Vere needed a Queen and that Uriel spoke endlessly of his younger sister's beauty and other merits. Uriel's judgement was never all one might have wished, but on the subject of his sister, he was far from objective. She was beautiful, yes, but she was also frail and dependent, in need of constant attention and prone to fits of depression if she did not get it. Never a keen politcal mind, Vere was impetuous and easily gulled by appearances; she was beautiful and her family was important -- what more could he want? They were married in a whirlwind that carried them along for nearly a year before the first signs of trouble appeared.

At first Vere found Sive's constant desire for his approval and attentions amusing, even flattering, but soon enough they began to take on the character of demands and the burden of kingship already placed too many demands on his time. He had hoped his marriage would be an escape from those demands. When it failed, he sought his escape elsewhere in the arms of other women.

He had the sense to try to be discreet about it at first, but it was inevitable that such a thing could not remain secret forever. Word began to leak back to the Queen. Her periods of black depression grew more frequent and more obvious. That she could be Queen of everything and so bitterly unhappy, seemed impossible to her. Unable to muster the courage to confront her husband on this matter, she confided in her brother.

Vere, meanwhile, had fallen in love with one of his mistresses. He actually kept her identity fairly secret, maintaining several other mistresses as cover. I do not know for sure who she was, though I have a good guess. Some things are better left unsaid, however, even with some many long dead. You could sense a certain change in him. Subtle at first, but having finally found a small breath of the happiness he'd longed for, he could not keep tiny traces from becoming visible to those who saw him most often. The Queen, for all her faults, was not stupid. In fact, having wanted so long for him to show such feelings for her, she may have been the first to see the subtle signs. Seeing with your eyes is not the same as admitting in your heart, however, and she managed to deny the truth to herself for years. To this day, I am not sure if we are better or worse off for that.

Eventually, perhaps inevitably, something happened which even she could not deny. I do not know what. I am not sure anyone really does, for I suspect it happened in one of their private moments, and all who might say are long dead. Sive tried desparately to win him away from from his nameless love, but for once in his life Vere held fast. Ironically, his behavior towards her softened. He was more attentive, but it no longer mattered, for what the Queen wanted now was love. The fragile, vulnerable girl that was Sive had finally grown up, too late.

For his part, I think Vere was genuinely grieved by her death. Though his charm and good looks gave him the appearance of empathy, he really was quite poor at reading the subtle feelings of others. Sive's death unleashed a cascade of realizations that took him completely by surprise. He had not realized that she had changed just as much as he had, and he was suddenly faced with how much he had wronged her. I suppose we always feel the wrongs committed against ourselves more keenly than those we commit against others. The shock on his face as understanding slowly took him was matched only by the look of utter disbelief as Uriel's sword cut him in half only a week later at her funeral.