Pruning the Family Tree

Maybe she didn't need to deal with the individuals at all. Maybe there was a political solution, some sort of coup could cut through the entire matter. Get enough powerful people on side with Lyvia becoming the head of House Donnelle, and it wouldn't matter if the others in line would object, their opinion wouldn't matter if they didn't have the power to enforce it. The trouble was that within the house, the most powerful people were the very ones in line to inherit. There were other figures on the sidelines who might support Lyvias ascension, but it might be hard to convince anyone to act against their own interests.

As for power outside the house… a military takeover would draw a lot of unwanted attention and questions about the legitimacy of her taking control. And that was assuming they could pull off a bloodless coup. If there was resistance, it could end up as an unthinkable bloodbath. Plus it would invite those with more military force to exact their own takeover, if that were an acceptable way of taking power.

…If the Lord Ruler himself could be convinced to intervene, then almost anything was possible, and none but the most foolhardy would dare to object. A simple, uncomplicated plan with no downsides other than the insurmountable task of somehow getting the Lord Ruler to take a personal interest in such matters.

Lyvia sighed. If anything, trying to jump straight to taking power seemed even worse than trying to take out individuals. If only she could convince each of them to just step aside for her. There were rules for abdication in place. While a House Lord couldn't just name their own successor in defiance of the rules of succession, they were at liberty to renounce their own claim on the title and allow it to pass to the next in line. It was possible that not everyone ahead of her was interested in ruling House Donnelle anyway.

Lyvia traced her finger back along the family tree, considered each of the others in line to inherit in turn. That then brought it back to the three Donnelle siblings…

Aside from Tanniker, there was Portisha. A spoiled brat, and an airhead who could too easily become enamored by honeyed words delivered by a suitably handsome face. She was already drawing interest from men more concerned about what a relationship with a noblewoman like Portisha could do for them than any care for her as a person. If it looked like she would inherit, then the jackals would swarm all the more eagerly.

It would hardly matter how Portisha would conduct herself as the head of House Donnelle… within months at the most she would have been swept off her feet by some lothario who would then be the one with control of the reins.

Ha, the reigns! If control of the house itself were all that mattered, Lyvia might consider sponsoring such a suitor herself, provided she had some means to keep him willing to take instructions. But she was tired of working from the shadows and operating through others. As a temporary step, perhaps, but not as a final goal.

Then there was Cymon.

Above all else, Cymon was what stayed her hand from disposing of Tanniker immediately. Tanniker was a fool who thought himself shrewd, who was slowly bleeding the house dry through his misjudged business decisions. But Cymon was a loutish, boorish, detestable drunk, a shameless letch and philandering womanizer, a gambling addict with a losing streak and an impulsive wastrel.

Their father Tyden had Cymon on a strict allowance to limit the damage he could do, a practice Tanniker had continued. Cymon squandered what he was given, and then ran up debts all over Luthadel to the point that he could scarcely dare step foot in the city for more than a couple of days at a time lest his creditors catch up with him.

There were other potential successors who might do damage to House Donnelle, or be hard to remove once in place. But if Cymon got unfettered access to the house coffers, there wouldn't be anything left of the house's fortune or its good name to be worth ruling.

Lyvia leaned back to take in the whole of the document once more. Running through the successors one by one did make the task less imposing than it had initially appeared. One blessing was that none of them were in a position to have any additional heirs in the near future. In fact the only couple of child bearing age was… herself and Tanniker.

It was hard to avoid thoughts of Lyvia's plans for a family together. She and Tanniker would have been a power couple in Luthadel politics, and raised their children to be righteous successors, taught from their youth to prepare them to take over the house affairs and expand their influence, to go forth and make bold choices, to live happy and prosperous lives, to make the world a better place. They could have been a dynasty…

Now the idea of bringing a child into the world with that man was repellant to her.

It would be a potentially simple solution…

According to the rules of succession, the child would be first in line. It would be only natural for Lyvia to be their regent until they were old enough to take over the rule of the house themselves. Everything else would be moot… Cymon would continue to live on the pittance he was permitted, Portisha could marry whoever she pleased, the rest could do what they will, and it wouldn't matter at all.

Lyvia and her child would rule. But even if she could bring herself to bear Tanniker's child, she couldn't countenance using her child as a political pawn that way.

No, she would have to forget about children for now. Perhaps one day she would find a man who was everything that Tanniker should have been… perhaps then… you never knew what the future would bring.

And that was the most important thing of all to remember. This diagram was not the board, fixed and unmoving. You never knew what move another might make that could shake things up completely. This was a painting, a captured moment in time of what things were.

But there were endless possibilities for what could be. It wasn't about having a plan. It was about having contingencies. You might not know everything that would happen, but you could put pieces in place ready to capitalize on new opportunities.

Lyvia carefully rolled up the scroll and slipped the ribbon back over the tube. The information it contained did present a challenge, but also a host of opportunities. She would need to learn more before she was ready to make a major move. But there were plenty of places to start.

She could do this. She knew it!