A Crown Disowned

by Andre Norton

  "Most likely. War-kats hate them. You will notice that Tusser has no war-kats both from his preference, or, I imagine, theirs. They have yet to put themselves on the side of any but the defenders in a dispute."

  "Remarkable," Rohan said.

  "Yes, very. Ah, we're here."

  "Here" proved to be an open space, far enough to the northern side of the camp to satisfy the Sea-Rover marines' craving for danger, and yet well within the stockade. Nearby, a number of shelters made from the fragrant, dark green branches of trees were being constructed under Hynnel's supervision. He caught sight of Rohan and Gaurin and waved to them. Then he checked to see that the building was proceeding correctly and made his way over to them.

  "The Bog-men did not bring any tents," he said, "and so we have to make do with hunting shelters."

  "They will be as well off that way as they were in the Bog. I notice that Harous has placed the Army of the Bog-men near Rohan's encampment."

  To keep even this small a group—perhaps a hundred men in all—segregated from the

  Rendelians, Rohan thought. Aloud, he said, "Well/the pact was between us and them."

  "You can rest assured that your allies will be treated fairly," Gaurin said,

  "with my kinsman in charge of their welfare."

  Giving Gaurin a casual salute, Hynnel returned to his task. In the area set aside for the Sea-Rovers, some of the marines had already set up Rohan's shelter and supplies along with his battle flag, and were now busy erecting their own tents. Good smells were wafting from the cook tent. Rohan recognized fish stew, a Sea-Rover staple while out on raids.

  Rohan ushered Keltin and Bitta inside, and, under Gaurin's instructions, fed them some of the stew. They lapped at it enthusiastically.

  "I think they'll be all right here for a while," he told Gaurin. "I'm going back to the fleet. At first light, I want to take Spume-Maiden up the coast a few leagues, and see what I can discover. She's our fastest ship, and her captain used to dandle me on his knee."

  "That is a sound notion," Gaurin said. "I will be eager for your report."

  After Gaurin left with Rohan, Harous indicated to Hynnel and Tusser that their session for the day was over. "We've done enough," he said to Hynnel. "I suggest that you go with the Bog general to see to the disposition of his men and make sure that they are snug and well situated. We should get as much rest as possible now, for we do not know when we will be called to arms."

  Hynnel saluted and left at once. To Harous's mild surprise, Tusser put up no argument, though he had been quite vocal ever since the moment the Bog-man had arrived with his tiny, ridiculous rag-tag "army" at his heels. Instead, he obediently followed Hynnel through the tent opening though he did not offer the courtesy of a salute. No better than Frydians. They were the same, really, except that the Bog-men lived their lives wet and the Frydians slogged through their days in deep and heavy snow. Their only difference lay in the fact that

  Bog-men were on the side of Rendel, and Frydians weren't.

  Amused by his own thoughts, Harous decided not to make an issue of it. Then he gave orders that the brazier be moved to his private quarters, at the back of the tent, accessible through a double flap in the wall between the rooms.

  He could have had two braziers; his rank entitled him to that and more. But he felt it best, as a matter of morale, to forego such minor luxuries. Actually, it was no great hard- ship. Within a matter of only a few minutes, the smaller room was comfortable.

  Even the flooring was not exceptionally cold throughout the structure, being a double layer of wood planks with space between them.

  Harous took off his outer garments and lay down on the camp bed, stretching out with his hands behind his head. This bed, at least, was a luxury he allowed himself. Common soldiers rolled up in blankets, or fur robes, or slept in their clothing on whatever ground cover they had been able to find to line the floor of their shelters.

  He counted the days since he had left Cragden Keep. More than enough time for any effects of the stirrup-cup to have made themselves known if she had somehow switched the goblets again. Or—the thought suddenly struck him—if she had foreseen that he would switch them and had drugged her own goblet in anticipation of such a move. Would that subtlety be beyond her? He thought about it, and then decided that it would not. It would not even have been beyond her to drug both goblets with a mixture to which she had carefully rendered herself immune.

  Now that, he thought, was indulging in sheer fantasy— more than a little sick fantasy at that. He wished he could dismiss the notion that she had put something in the wine. But that nagging suspicion would not go away.

  He seemed healthy enough. He felt well. Perhaps the whole matter was just his overwrought imagination at work. In the morning, he decided, he would go out reconnoitering and have a look for himself at those notches in the mountains, and perhaps find a suitable ground for battle, when it finally came. And he would go alone. He was tired of the company of men. Indeed, he was tired of the company of Rendel.

  Harous made sure the candle on the little table beside his bed was properly trimmed before he pulled up a fur-lined robe, turned over, and fell asleep.

  Six

  The Lady Marcala, Countess of Cragden, awakened with a dull, persistent pain in her midsection. It was still dark, the middle of the night, and the candle at her bedside was close to guttering out. She dragged herself out of bed, wondering if she had eaten something that disagreed with her at supper. Perhaps she had made a mistake to allow herself a degree of festivity after Harous's departure, eating heartily of meat, which she usually avoided. She found another candle, lit it, and carried it to her dressing table.

  She looked awful—awful! She had dark circles under her eyes and her complexion had turned to paste. Then, as she continued to gaze into the mirror, realization came to her.

  In a burst of sheer fury mingled with terror, Marcala snatched up a silver-gilt box of face powder and hurled it at the glass. The mirror shattered; the box broke and powder fogged the air, to dust the table.

  "No," she whispered. And then, louder, almost a cry of panic, "Nol"

  Heavy-eyed with sleep, Reuta, her maid, hurried into the room. "Lady?"

  "It's nothing," Marcala assured her. "I just had a little accident, that's all.

  You can go back to sleep and clean up the mess in the morning."

  "Yes, Lady."

  The last thing Marcala wanted at the moment was to have someone hanging over her, offering to help. Knowing that she was probably already beyond help, nevertheless she carried the candle over to a chest where she kept certain medicines and hurriedly mixed an emetic. With an effort, she forced herself to drink it down. Purging her stomach would surely draw the trouble out of her system.

  That treacherous beast, Harous. And it was she herself who had been stupid! If only she had not drunk the stirrup-cup. She had planned not to swallow a drop, just in case he managed to switch the vessels. Too confident, she had been so sure all was in perfect order! He had not touched the tray from the moment he set it down to wait until all in the ward had been served. How had he done it?

  A wave of nausea gripped Marcala. She stumbled to snatch at a basin, just in time. When she was finally able to lift her head she did, indeed, feel a little better. The next few days would tell the tale. If she had been quick enough, she would be very ill for a time, but she would live. If not…

  Marcala climbed back in bed, but not to sleep.

  I am not poisoned, she told herself. It is too soon. It must be that the joint had gone off a little and I am not used to meat. Better in the morning, I know.

  If I had drunk the poison, it would have taken longer for me to feel the effects.

  Yet, she had mixed that dose for a strong, active man, not a slight woman. He would have ailed slightly for a few days, and then—well past the time for anyone to make a connection between the ceremony of departure and his current illness—he would sicken rapidly, linger for a while, and then
, most regrettably, die.

  I think I was in time if it was the stirrup-cup, Marcala told herself. Why didn't I put it in his food, in the bowl of breakfast gruel? Why did I have to be so reckless and hasty to give it to him before all his men?

  Maybe—-just maybe—he had drunk the poisoned wine after all and even now could be feeling the effects.

  No, it was the meat that sickened me, she told herself. It is only that.

  After all, it had been a long time since she had poisoned someone personally.

  Her last victim had been the real Lady Marcala, and that had been accomplished at a great distance, away back east in Valvager.

  Now she recalled the Dowager's words, describing the lady when Ysa was proposing that Marfey—the name she was using at the time—take the woman's place. Ysa had been queen then, wed to King Boroth, who was still clinging to life.

  "She has black hair. By the left corner of her mouth there is a small dark mole which is said to enhance her charms rather than detract from them. Graceful, she dances well, and ever has an eye for a well-built man. Her favorite colors are violet, deep rose, gold and the peach-pink shade of vaux lilies for which she has a great liking and wears in her hair whenever there is a chance to do so.

  Also she wears perfume made from these flowers."

  Marcala knew the woman well, but nonetheless asked for a likeness. Appearances might have altered over the years. As she had gazed at the miniature, she knew that their close resemblance to each other, even to the beauty mark Marcala habitually covered with cosmetics, had not diminished at all. Even Ysa had remarked upon it.

  Not surprising, considering that the real Marcala had been her half-sister. They shared the same father. Marfey, or Darya, or Vira, or whatever other name the woman who had become known as the Queen of Spies chose to use, had been sent away as a small child from Valvager and reared elsewhere. An embarrassment to the earl, she thought bitterly. Hated by the earl's wife.

  Thanks to Queen Ysa, she had come into the estate that her noble blood entitled her to. Harous—She remembered how, at first, her association with him had been only Ysa's wish. Marcala had always been too prudent to allow herself the luxury of falling in love. Still, she had come to love Harous, had been jealous of him and his transparent ambition to gain the Rendel throne through the Ash heiress, that simpering little twit, Ashen.

  The irony struck Marcala anew and, in spite of the fear she had managed to push aside for the moment, she chuckled. Two women, engaged in making their way in the world, both the bastard daughters of noblemen. But in Ashen's case, her father had been Boroth, King of Rendel, and Marcala's only the Earl of Valvager.

  Nevertheless, the similarity of their situations had always amused her, in a bitter sort of way. She, the daughter of a minor earl, had managed to snare the leading nobleman of Rendel. Ashen had not fared so well. At Marcala's suggestion, Ysa had married Ashen first to the Sea-Rover heir, and then to a near stranger from the North. That the fellow was rumored to be a kind of prince in his homeland meant nothing in Rendel. Here he was just one more noble among many, his rank inferior to Harous's. This had always been pleasant to contemplate.

  Until recently.

  When had things changed between Harous and herself? And, for that matter, how had it happened that she had forgotten her own rule sufficiently to fall in love with him?

  Marcala forced herself to think, to remember. Such was better than dwelling on what might just be happening within her body. Harous had said something, during that quarrel on their last night before he left, about a spell…

  A hazy memory swam into her mind, an occasion when Ysa had invited her up to the very private chamber at the top of the highest tower in Rendelsham Castle.

  Marcala concentrated, and the recollection sharpened.

  Without surprise, she had noted that Ysa was indulging in spell-casting. When a rustling noise as of something shifting in its sleep attracted her attention she noted the presence of something near, hidden in a satin-lined basket. It must be what she had only heard rumored—a flying creature, not natural, that the Queen sent out from time to time when she was gathering information. Spying on whomever she chose.

  No wonder, Marcala thought now, Ysa was so interested in that amulet she had stolen for the Dowager Queen. That must have been the means for summoning a similar creature.

  She herself had not been exactly honest with Ysa. She had told the Dowager she didn't know how to use the amulet. In fact, she had read the spell in the book on which the chest had rested, there in Harous's secret room. Now she wished she had not been so quick to turn the amulet over to the Dowager. She would have liked to have known how Harous fared.

  She clung to her memory, reconstructing how it had been when she stopped being entirely her own woman and became in thrall to Harous. Ysa had instructed her to put her hands on the royal shoulders during the spelling, to lend strength. Just as well, for Ysa had collapsed. Without Marcala, the Queen might have died.

  Could it have been from the effort of casting the spell to affect both Harous and her? It had been very shortly after that moment that she had begun to think of him as more than someone she could use—a very distant relative who had been kind enough to open his house to her.

  It could only have been the effects of Ysa's spell that caused Marcala to open her bed to Harous, to divert his attention from Ashen. It had been not merely for her own pleasure, though that was certainly a part of it. She had burned for him and he was not indifferent. Also, she yearned then to save him from himself.

  His ambitious pursuit of the Ash heiress, with her measure of royal blood, would have netted him nothing but the headsman's axe, when his schemes became so blatant that they could not be politely overlooked.

  Just as she in turn could not overlook the threats he had made against her.

  Nobody—not even Count Harous of Crag-den, Lord High Marshal of Rendel—could threaten to kill or divorce the Queen of Spies, and go unpunished. For that alone he had to die. A momentary pang of pity touched her. Once, there had been a time when they had been happy with each other…

  Ysa, contrary woman that she was, at first tried to block Marcala's plan for marrying Harous. Marcala smiled to herself, remembering. How frightened Ysa had been, when she let the Dowager know that the real Valvager heiress had died.

  Marcala made certain, without saying anything outright, that Ysa was quite aware of who had been responsible for that very convenient death, even if she didn't know the particulars. The Countess was confident that Ysa had since investigated, and was equally confident that her agent who had handled the matter had left no traces. In fact, he had used the same poison as the one she had put into the stirrup-cup meant for Harous.

  Which brought her full circle. Fresh fear gripped her.

  I am not poisoned, she told herself. I am not.

  The Lord High Marshal of Rendel would normally have gone nowhere without a squad of soldiers at his back. However, now he gave orders that he was to go out of the camp alone.

  "Chevin," he told his lieutenant, now holding the office of aide-de-camp, "being penned in here has begun to irk me. I want to see what I can discover on my own.

  You know that I am a skilled man of the out-of-doors, and so I can avoid the enemy if I should come upon them. A company of heavy-footed soldiers would be my doom."

  "As you command, sir," Chevin replied, but Harous could see that he did not approve. "Please, for all our sakes, do not be gone long."

  "That I promise. Now, get about your duties. You will be in charge in my absence."

  Glad to escape the confinement of the camp and his responsibilities as leader of the Four Armies for a little while, Harous donned a white cloak over his winter garments and slipped out. In a short time, he had left the stockade behind to make his way toward that narrow gap in the range of mountains where his chances of seeing without being seen were better than on the sea road.

  Chevin, he thought, was completely loyal, but nowhere near the
caliber of

  Hynnel. How had Gaurin managed to get an exiled king for his second in command?

  Also, Cebastian and Lathrom were excellent members of Gaurin's staff, not to mention Rohan. He envied Gaurin his ability to attract able men to him. And women. Ashen—

  He put that thought aside firmly, resolving to study the Nordor closely to learn what his secret might be. Until Gaurin had come to Rendel, it had been Harous who was considered the rising noble, to whom all drew nigh in hopes of having his luck rub off on them. But now it was all Gaurin, Gaurin, Gaurin. The man moved like a war-kat, with never any wasted motion but always purposeful and, above all, confident. In any other man it would have been arrogance. Harous felt awkward by comparison.

  Gloomy thoughts, also to be put aside firmly. His discontent deepened until it was almost palpable.

  It was a gray day, promising more snow, and clouds veiled the thin winter sun.