by Ellyn, Court
When the nursery door opened and shut, Rhoslyn grit her teeth. It was Kelyn or Alovi again, come to pull her away or convince her to get some rest. To the Abyss with you, she wanted to say. Leave us be.
“But you sent for me, didn’t you?”
Rhoslyn whirled in her chair. Thorn Kingshield stood among the strewn toys. Without his rich robe, he looked more like his old, unkempt self, dusty and wrinkled. Mud and darker splotches that looked suspiciously like blood smeared the front of the white linen shirt. He offered a tentative smile. “I came as fast as I could. Saffron found me in the middle of a hunt, I’m sorry. Kelyn tried to explain what hap—”
Rhoslyn smashed a hand over her face and failed to restrain the sobs. “It’s my fault, Thorn. Please. Undo it.”
His jaw knotted, and he approached the bedside where his niece lay bundled up in the pink lace. Mud and all, he perched on the edge of the bed to feel Carah’s brow, her pulse. His expression of befuddlement hardened into a frown. “Tell me everything, Your Grace.”
Her throat tight and aching around the words, she told him what she could.
“Your cut?” he asked.
“Healed.” She’d been too worried about her daughter to think to examine it. All that remained was a little white line where the flesh had knit. “Completely healed.”
Thorn nodded, not at all amazed, but nor was he less troubled. “Leave me alone with her. Mother and Kelyn are outside. Go to them.”
Rhoslyn rose, reluctant, then gave her daughter’s hand one last caress.
“Your Grace?” Thorn added. She glanced down at his uplifted face, and her breath clogged in her throat. “I can’t promise anything. If she doesn’t—”
She stopped him with the pressure of her fingers on his shoulder. The fear in his eyes was too much for her to bear. She hurried from the nursery.
With a burdened sigh, Thorn bowed his head. “Saffron, what am I to do? I’ve never seen anything like this.” Carah wasn’t feverish, rather chilled in fact. How gray her cheeks; she might be a corpse lying there, but for the faint breath Thorn detected on his face as he leant close.
A golden glow appeared above Carah’s pillow, no brighter than the lamp burning atop the armoire. A tiny face surrounded by swirling yellow hair peered down at the child. “She’s lost in there somewhere,” said Saffron. “You must find her. Remember when I taught you to listen with your avedra ears, my Thorn? Try to find her instinctive place.”
“Right.” Breathing deeply, Thorn heard his breath shaking in his throat. If he failed … no, he dared not think about it. Above all, he couldn’t lose this little girl. Had he ever loved and adored anyone more? Careful, he had to be so careful. If the delicate vessel of Carah’s mind was cracked, might his intrusion shatter it irreparably? He placed his fingers on each of her temples and a thumb to the pulse in her throat. His eyes closed, and a dull pain tingled along his nerves as his awareness made contact with hers. He had expected a place concocted purely of dreams, but what he found was a place of the spirit as well. No wonder Carah appeared to be dying. Her bright little soul had flown almost completely from her body. Thorn followed the bright thread, as he had once followed that of his brother when the demon attacked. Gently, gradually, he tracked her through a gray mist until he came upon a bright invention of her imagination. The snowy summit of Mount Drenéleth reared up from meadows so green and lush that they could exist only in the mind. Four falcons raced about the crags, and Carah rode one of them.
There you are, Thorn said.
Carah gave a little jolt under his fingers, as if he had surprised her. He felt himself repulsed. Carah’s awareness receded, as deft as a butterfly evading his touch.
Don’t be afraid, love. Please, don’t run from me!
Uncle Thorn? What are you doing here?
A falcon shrieked, Let us fly, and Carah implored, Let me fly. How could she have understood what she was doing when she wrapped her hand around Rhoslyn’s finger? She had acted on blind instinct. She simply knew she could make Mum better. But when her task was finished, Carah had been unable to separate herself cleanly; instead of returning to her body, her awareness kept traveling, taking her spirit with it. Now she didn’t want to wake. Indeed, how breathtaking and delightful it must feel, the speed of the falcon’s flight, the stone arms of the mountain and the valleys of snow blurring away below. Don’t make me come down, she cried, her little fists gripping handfuls of feathers.
How to convince her without forcing her? You’re not flying, love, he said, sitting with her on the falcon’s broad back. You’re only dreaming. Come home with me and wake. Your mum and da are afraid. They think you’re gone forever. Come show them that’s not true.
Carah’s large blue eyes peered up at him. The wind blew her hair across her face. Just a little longer? Please?
Ah, this glorious freedom. Thorn wanted to stay and fly forever, too, but his body, sitting in a chair beside a little bed bedecked in pink lace, whispered, “No.”
Yes! Carah insisted, and storm clouds gathered about the mountain peak.
Ah, Goddess, help me, Thorn prayed.
A brilliant white light appeared over Drenéleth’s spire and brushed aside the gathering storm.
She answers me, Thorn whispered, hardly able to believe it and feeling that he must now die from the longing that ached in his chest. When this age of kings is over… But here she was, so soon, and he raised a hand toward her. The falcon, too, careened toward the light. Carah giggled and clapped her hands. A voice said, Go with Kieryn Dathiel, child. Kharah has work to do. Playtime is over. Though the voice was soothing and resonated with Precious, precious to me, the command was not to be argued with. The falcon alighted upon the narrow summit of the peak, and Carah drifted down to stand on her own two feet. When she turned, the falcon was gone, and Thorn stood in its place. He lowered a hand, and she took it.
Upon the pillow, Saffron smiled.
Carah whimpered, and she and Thorn opened their eyes together. Her voice raw and faint, she said, “Uncle Thorn, it’s not my birthday.”
The strength gone from his spine, Thorn fell back in the chair, chuckling in relief. “You gave us a terrible scare, love.”
“I did?” Confusion made her eyes large and soulful. “But I was just dreaming.”
Thorn dried a cold sweat with his sleeve and, as if the task were as arduous as scaling a mountain, he lifted his niece into his lap and held her close. His arms shook with the effort. “Carah, you must listen to me. Do you remember your mother’s finger?”
She frowned for a moment, then nodded. “I painted falcons, and she bleeded on them.”
“Did you know that you healed her finger?”
She nodded again, reluctant this time. She seemed to think he was going to be angry with her.
“What you did for your mother was a good thing, love. But you mustn’t do it again. Not until I’ve trained you.”
“Trained me?”
This was a new word to her. “Till I teach you how to do it properly.”
“Oh. When?”
He brushed a hand across her brow, across her cheek, and felt warmth flooding her face again. Healthy pink flushed away the frightening gray color. “Sixteen. When I come for your sixteenth birthday, we’ll begin your training.”
“Sixteen!” she exclaimed, her vitality rebounding more quickly than his. “But that’s a hundred years from now.”
“Well, maybe not quite a hundred,” Thorn said. “But that’s my decision. Agreed?”
Pouting, fingers twisting the hem of her blanket into a knot, she nodded. “Agreed.” She squirmed around until she could wrap an arm around his neck. “But, Uncle Thorn?” she asked around a yawn. “Can we ride the falcons again sometime?”
He would like nothing better.
~~~~
6
In the fall of 985 After Elves, after five years without a sovereign, Fiera’s alabaster throne was occupied once again …
—Chronicle of Kings
The perfume of exotic incense drifted through Prince Nathryk’s chambers. A delightful Ixakan woman with skin the color of teak danced like a snake before the blazing fireplace. Sweat glittered between her breasts like scales. A drummer and a flutist played a swaying sort of music, making Nathryk as dizzy as the wine.
Upon his sixteenth birthday, nearly two years ago, King Bano’en granted him his own apartment in the west wing of the palace. He had a view of Graynor Harbor and the sea beyond. Nathryk hated the sea, but he had to remember that Leanians valued that damned expanse of roiling water and ships that sailed upon it more than the clothes on their backs and the wine in their cups. So he supposed Bano’en meant to honor him with this particular view. With the allowance his Aunt Ki’eva sent him monthly he had furnished the suite in dark silks and heavy brocade. Hardly a patch of wall was left to be seen among the drapes and pillars rearing up like mighty pavilion posts. Three dining tables were arrayed with fruit and cheese, brandy and wine. Couches and settees surrounded the tables so that his guests had to reach no farther than arm’s length for one decadent morsel or another.
More than adequate accommodations for a prisoner of state. Walking into his apartment was like walking into another world, a world where he could forget about his prolonged captivity. It was almost over, thank the Mother. The grand andyr trees beyond his balcony had started to turn burgundy, and their nuts drooped in heavy clusters. When the snows lay thick on the branches, he would turn eighteen. Then, of his own free will, he would return home, ride through Brynduvh’s gates in triumph, and climb the dais to his throne. At last. At long last.
He drank deeply of the wine. The silken feel of it in his mouth was almost as delicious as the hand caressing his chest. “My prince is weary?” muttered the red lips near his ear.
“No, your prince is drunk,” he replied, shoving her hand deeper into his robe. She was just a common whore, but what couldn’t she do with her thumbs?
Proper courtesans who catered to highborns were too expensive for his purse, but that was his aunt’s fault. He’d pleaded time and again for more money, but she was no fool. He made do, regardless, and his parties had made him popular among certain circles throughout Graynor. Granted, they made him unpopular in others. How often had King Bano’en personally chided Nathryk for his decadent lifestyle? How often had Nathryk told the king that he could, at any time, send his hostage back home and be quit of his company forever? The argument never worked. Apparently, Nathryk hadn’t displeased Bano’en badly enough, not yet.
Were the king’s spies so incompetent that they didn’t know the full extent of Nathryk’s activities? He didn’t think so. No, Nathryk suspected that Bano’en was merely biding his time. Easy enough to keep his mouth shut and his ward hidden away for a few more months. At this point, Bano’en didn’t have to care if Nathryk got bastards and diseases from the harbor doxies.
Even Prince Ha’el steered clear of Nathryk. One would think a younger man might appreciate Nathryk’s appetites, but Ha’el was as much a disappointment as his father. Last summer, after the prince married Lady Endhal’s daughter, Nathryk asked him, “Haven’t you ever wanted to take it from him?”
Ha’el’s piggy little eyes hadn’t bothered rising from the chessboard. He was a dismal player, and Nathryk waited patiently for the chance to pounce his king. “What are you talking about?”
“The throne, from your father.”
Ha’el looked up at that.
“I mean, he could live another thirty years.”
“Never speak to me again, on any matter whatever.” Ha’el knocked over his king and rose abruptly from the table. “In my country we have penalties for inciting treason, and it would give me pleasure to cut out your tongue.”
So Nathryk had to find companionship among his inferiors.
It was easy enough to sneak whores, musicians, and players into the palace. Pay the right sentries, clear the right corridors at the right hours, and Nathryk could host parties for days on end before anyone reported missing wine and lamp oil, and strange people creeping about looking for the middens to vomit in. Even the most reluctant guards were easily bribed with an additional incentive: “Come join us. I’ll expect you when you’re off duty. There will be plenty of wine and women to go around. See you there.”
The guard from West Market Gate had accepted the invitation. His hairy arse pumped between the knees of a squealing dock whore. “Careful, Rubart,” called Nathryk, reaching for the flask to refill his goblet, “we’ve not had that one examined for rashes yet.” Sprawled on cushions and couches, several of his guests snickered. A playwright with a hooded boy on his lap quoted a line about loving a lady from the stews. But the guard paid them no mind. Nathryk pulled a knife from a block of soft white cheese and took careful aim. The wine made his vision wobbly. With a flick of his wrist, the knife somersaulted over the drummer’s headdress and pinned the guard in the buttocks. He yowled and danced free of the whore’s legs and jerked the knife free. Drunk as he was, he stared at it for some time before he recognized the item that had bitten him; by then Nathryk and his guests were holding their bellies in laughter.
“Hey, now!” Rubart exclaimed. He tossed down the knife, hitched up his pants, and advanced with fists doubled.
“Careful,” Nathryk said. The guard stopped in the middle of the rug, at last heeding the slurring little voice in his inebriated brain that warned him of striking a prince. He loomed over Nathryk, blinking heavily. His fists relaxed. “If you’re going to make a fuss,” Nathryk purred, “you can’t come to my parties anymore. Go get stitched up and be grateful I gave you enough wine to numb the pain. Come again tomorrow, will you?”
“Not if I’m gonna be His Highness’s pin cushion.”
The guests thought that a lovely joke and laughed. “You can be my pin cushion instead,” declared young Edryd, Nathryk’s favorite fencing partner.
“Don’t listen to him,” said Nathryk, soothing the guard’s ego. “Go on, shoo, and don’t forget to finish yourself off before you pass out, or you’ll be in greater pain than I could induce.”
The guard hobbled off, a hand pressed over the bloody blotch blooming on his trousers. The abandoned doxie rolled onto her belly and popped grapes into her mouth, untroubled by the interruption. One of the acting troop’s mimes grabbed her by the hips and took over the guard’s unfinished business, but the doxie didn’t mind that either, just kept eating those grapes.
The swaying music wound down at last, and the snake dancer dipped in a deep curtsy behind a peacock fan. Her eyelids were painted gold. The drummer picked up a livelier rhythm and fingers flew across flute and harp.
Just about the time the drum matched Nathryk’s pulse and eased him into a warm haze, the woman nuzzling his neck opened her damn mouth again: “Rumor says my prince is to be married.”
He shoved her off the couch. Her arm darted up to shield her face. The music stopped. All eyes clung to him, waiting for the tantrum and dreading it. These same actors, guards, courtiers, and townspeople had seen enough crockery smashed, food dumped, and faces bruised to fear the worst. Tonight, however, the wine seemed to have dulled Nathryk’s temper rather than inflamed it. He sank back on the couch and said, “It might be true. Such is the province of princes. Pity me.”
“Oh, we do, Highness,” cooed the playwright. “Princes know no freedom.”
“None at all. Duty first. Always duty first.” Nathryk tried to squeeze the dizziness from his head. The room was damnably hot. “I don’t even know her. I glimpsed her only once. This morning, in fact. Queen Pa’ella pointed her out to me. I was on one side of the throne room and this … girl … on the other, and a hundred people separated us. I was so angry, I fled the court.”
“Justly so,” said the playwright.
“What’s she like, Highness?” asked one of the actresses. The top of her gown hung down around her waist.
“A milksop. Pale, spiritless, likely lacking a single intelligent thought in her chub
by little head.” He had to marry, he knew that, and while he didn’t want a demanding, despotic queen to trouble him, he didn’t want to marry a corpse either.
“How can you find out? You can refuse her, I mean?” asked the lute player.
His guests gathered close around his couch, his own bawdy, ragged little court.
“Shall I spy on her for you?” asked one of the handmaids to Lady Somebody Or Other.
“Like you spy on me?” Nathryk retorted.
“I never!” The handmaid was almost convincing. It took a whore in jewels to act properly coy. “I come because I love you, Highness. You know that.”
Nathryk scoffed. Bloody damned whoring spy.
“Send for her!” cried the playwright with a flourish of his hand. “Let us judge for ourselves if our prince should accept this girl.”
“Yes!” cried the rest.
Grinning, Nathryk reached behind his couch and pulled a bell rope. In moments, his manservant entered the parlor and bowed. “More wine, Highness?”
“No, no, Ansel. I require the presence of … what’s her name? The lady whom Bano’en proposes I wed. Bring her.”
Ansel’s eyes widened and darted about the parlor. “Here?” He was a round, ridiculous man who knew better than to argue with Nathryk.
“Yes, here! Where else? I will interview her here. Now. If she’s awake.” He was losing his spine. “Wake her, damn it! Her prince summons her, and do not return without her.”
Ansel scurried off.
Nathryk pried himself off the couch and stumbled about devouring bread and gulping ice-cold water. In twenty minutes or so, he’d be tolerably sober again. The girl appeared on the threshold in less than ten. Eager to please was she? Good.
“Let us see, then, what kind of queen Bano’en thinks Fiera should have,” he muttered, pushing himself away from the dining table. Nathryk waved Ansel out and attempted his usual cat-like glide across the parlor. The wine unsteadied his legs, however, causing him to sidestep, but only once.