by Tad Williams
He lost track then of exactly what the queen of the Rooftoppers was saying, his thoughts spinning in unhappy circles until the ceremony was over.
The tiny man with the trumpet stood at Chert's feet, shouting at the top of his lungs. "Her Majesty wishes to speak to you, Chert of Blue Quartz."
Antimony patted him on the back. "You go. I will wait for you on the stairs. I am too fretful I will step on someone here."
"Don't take long with your flirtations, old man," his wife told him. "We have a great deal to see to at home."
"What are you talking about?" said Chert. "You must meet the queen, Opal. It is an honor. How many queens have you met?"
"Really? But I'm not dressed for it…"
"Gods of raw earth, woman, you spent the entire morning making certain you had on the right garb. Come along. Beetledown was my friend-and he helped rescue Flint, too."
His wife's face suddenly betrayed such deep unhappiness that he wished he hadn't said anything, but it was too late to take it back. He took her arm and led her forward, walking with small, sliding steps to give their hosts ample time to get out of his way.
Queen Upsteeplebat had been lifted up onto her saddled dove and waited for them with the serenity of a small but artful carving. When Chert and Opal had shuffled close enough, they carefully lowered themselves to their knees so they could see her better.
"You are very kind to come, Chert of Blue Quartz," the queen said. "And this must be your wife, the Lady Opal." She nodded. "We have heard so much good of you from Flint and Chert, Mistress. I thank you also for coming. Beetledown the Bowman meant much to us." She shook her head. "We will never forget him, nor will we ever be able to replace him."
To Chert's surprise and pleasure, Opal was clearly charmed by the miniature queen. "You are too kind, Your Majesty. I liked Beetledown so much, too. A lovely lit… a lovely man. So many have been lost in the war-what terrible times!"
As he listened to his wife and the queen, Chert's attention was caught by Antimony, who was standing in the doorway of the Rooftoppers' sanctuary trying to catch his eye, beckoning. Chert carefully made his way back across the floor.
"You had better come." Antimony's face betrayed nothing.
"What is it?"
"Bring your wife, too, Master Chert."
He went back and made apologies to the Rooftoppers' monarch, who did not seem either insulted or unduly surprised, and led Opal out.
"What is this about?" his wife demanded. "You wanted me to meet her, then as soon as we're talking friendly-like, you yank me off as though I were a…" She stopped in the doorway, looking past Antimony at something Chert could not yet see. "Oh," she said. "Oh!" And then she was hurrying across the landing. "Praise the Elders!" she shouted. "Oh, come see!"
It was the boy, of course-Chert had known that by the sound of his wife's voice. As Opal squeezed him and rubbed tears all over his shoulder and neck-he had grown even taller in the past days, it seemed-Flint gave Chert a look that seemed to mix amusement and bafflement.
"But Mama Opal, I'm well," he said as she wept and touched his face. "I said I would see you again. Didn't they tell you?"
She laughed through her tears. "Hark to the boy. As if I shouldn't worry when he's vanished and half the world's tumbled down-and him right at the center of it all!"
Chert joined the embrace, if a little awkwardly. The boy was almost a head taller than he was now but still looked as though he might have seen nine summers at most. "Still, you shouldn't have made your mother worry so, lad. We didn't know where you were…"
"Come home," Opal said. "Come home and I will make your favorite-muldywarp stew. Oh, Chert, let's take him home."
Chert could not help noticing that Brother Antimony looked uncomfortable, even troubled. As the boy tried to get down the stairs under Opal's continued assault, hugging him and trying to hold his hands and several times almost toppling them both off the steep steps, Chert slowed until he was walking beside Antimony.
"Why the worried face?" he asked the monk as lightly as he could.
"Oh, it is nothing," Antimony said. "It only troubled me that bad luck should have forced me to leave Beetledown behind just so I could carry Nickel to safety-that… that…" He looked around as though Brother Nickel's supporters might even be there, in the upper floors of the Tower of Summer. "That miserly, self-important creature. What a waste to lose little Beetledown instead of him!"
"The Elders' plans are not always written clear," Chert said.
"But then I was thinking about how Flint knew just where to be-just where to be! Of all the tunnels of the Mysteries, he knew just where Beetledown would be coming and where the owl would catch him…" Antimony shook his head. "And I was thinking of that, and how he disappeared, and wondering how a mere boy could know such things… and then there he was! Standing directly in front of me on the stairs as if I had… as if I had conjured him up."
Chert felt a bit of a chill, too-not the first that his adopted son's actions had given him. "We have all had to get used to that. The boy… the boy is not like others."
Antimony's laugh was almost angry. "You are a wise man, Chert Blue Quartz, but that is far from the cleverest thing you've ever said. The boy is not like any other!"
"Chert!" Opal called back. "Did you hear what Flint said? You're going to have an audience with the princess-and I will be going, too!"
"What? Flint, what are you talking about?"
"An audience with the princess and many others, in two days' time," the boy said. "It is very important, Papa Chert. You really must go."
"With Princess Briony? And how did you hear of this?" he asked. "Did someone in the princess' household tell you?"
"Oh, no," he said, opening the door as they reached the bottommost floor. The late afternoon sun flooded in, so that for a moment Chert could not entirely make out the boy's shape and he seemed something else, something unknown. "No," Flint told him. "No one told me. I just thought of it."
50
Cuckoo in the Nest "Great Kernios declared that that since he had sent his wife away he was in need of another wife, and that if Zoria would take Mesiya's place, Kernios would let the gods take the Orphan up into heaven to live with them…"
-from "A Child's Book of the Orphan, and His Life and Death and Reward in Heaven"
To His Royal Highness, Eneas Karallios, Prince of Syan and North Krace,
My dear friend and protector,
It is with a heart still mourning my beloved father as well as pained by the loss of my twin brother, although at this moment he lives and breathes only a short walk from the room where I write this letter, that I come to this, a task I have been avoiding all day. I would rather tend to any number of dreary chores, such as the examination of the accounts with Nynor, which demonstrate my kingdom to be in just as shocking a condition of poverty and mismanagement as anyone might guess, than to write this. But write it I will, because the alternative would be to speak these painful words to your person, and to see their effect in your kind face.
Eneas, I cannot marry you. I promised I would consider it when I knew what fate awaited me here in Southmarch, and so I have pondered your proposal with the deepest and most grateful attention. Who would not be honored to have received such an offer? More importantly, what woman, even if she did not admire you as I do, would be foolish enough to turn such an offer down? Having traveled with you these months and seen your quality, I can promise you I am more honored than I can ever say, but I still cannot be your wife. The woman who will someday have that good fortune and reign at your side as queen, whoever she may be, will be perhaps the most fortunate of my sex in all of Eion.
Please understand, noble Eneas, there is no failing in yourself which leads me to this decision, no insufficiency in either your character or your treatment of me which urge me to decline you. You have been nothing but honorable to me, and your kindness has been far more than I could ever deserve, were I to dedicate my life from this moment on solely to earni
ng it. Rather, it is my country that makes demands upon me, my people who need me, and my ruined home that begs for my complete attention. I know that if I married you, I would not be discouraged from rebuilding Southmarch, or even giving the greatest part of my thoughts to my own people, but you would be doing your own subjects a disservice if you absented yourself from them, so we would marry division as well as each other. It also seems true to me that eventually, by the nature of your sex and the importance of your own country, Southmarch would become merely an outpost of Syan. That alone is enough to ensure that I marry no other monarch. Seeing what the last years have done to my beloved home has torn at my heart, and I have come to realize that I am, above all else, my father's daughter. I truly value my people more than my own happiness.
You will say that none of these are true impediments to a marriage, that they are the fears of a young woman who has suffered many losses. That may be, but you deserve better than to marry a halfhearted bride. You are the very paragon of Trigonate knighthood, dear Eneas, and you deserve a consort who can be always by your side without lamenting her own neglected kingdom.
But please know this-my debt to you is deep. Whatever happens, I pray that our two countries always remain friends, but even more so that you and I remain fast friends as well…
The guards observed his expression with alarm, but he ignored them-it was not the guards who had earned his anger.
One of the maids let him in; he paced the antechamber until she returned and led him through into Briony's retiring room. The princess had been writing a letter; as he came in she blotted it, rolled the parchment, and put it aside. The summer night was warm but Briony wore a heavy sleeping robe, perhaps for modesty's sake. The rest of the maids were still dressed, which was a good thing considering Ferras Vansen's plans.
"I must have some time to speak privily with Her Royal Highness," he said. "Princess, will you send your attendants away? I apologize for the intrusion, but it is a matter of utmost urgency."
She looked at him, trying to read his face. "Of course, Captain Vansen. Give them a moment to compose themselves. Ladies, I know that Duchess Merolanna sits up late these nights because she has trouble sleeping. You can find a fire and some company in her chambers."
When they had all trooped out, whispering at this strange and sudden intrusion, Briony seated herself in a large chair and drew her feet up beneath her. "You have my attention, Captain Vansen." She shook her head. "I will not be able to call you that much longer, will I? Soon the coronation will come, and the honors will be given…"
"Hang that," he said. "I care nothing for honors or titles. You know that."
"Why such anger at me?" she asked. "I looked to you many times yesterday but all I saw was your frowning displeasure. You would not meet my eye." For the first time her mask slipped a little and her voice shook. "I offered you my heart and my lips the night before. Why should that earn your scorn?"
He stood in front of her with fists clenching and unclenching. "Scorn? It was you who would not look at me! I tried to catch your eye when you first came and you stared at me as though you had never seen me before! As though you were so choked in shame you could not bear to show me even the kindness you show to the youngest stable boy, or even old Puzzle!"
Briony laughed, a sudden burst of merriment that caught him by surprise. "Puzzle! Gods, are you jealous of the jester because I kissed his head and gave him a couple of coppers? He is a century old if he is a day!"
Vansen hated being laughed at; he would rather have been back in the depths of the Mysteries being strangled by the autarch himself than to have this woman, whom he loved so much his heart ached when he was away from her, laugh at him that way. "You mock me, my lady. You mock your servant because he is nothing more than that-a servant. Your pardon. I was foolish to think I could be anything more." He turned and walked stiffly toward the door, his head like a windy night full of blowing leaves.
"Wait."
He stopped. She was his sovereign, after all.
"Turn and face me, Captain. It is not proper to stand with your backside to your queen."
Vansen turned. "With respect, Highness, you are not the queen yet."
Her eyes were red, but she was fighting not to laugh, which confused Ferras Vansen mightily. "Merciful Zoria, you were right, Captain Vansen. You are a fool!"
"Then if my ruler has no further need of me," he said loudly, "perhaps she will be so kind as to release me…"
"Gods in heaven, Vansen, what is wrong with you?" She put her pale feet on the floor and stood up, her arms wrapped tightly around herself. "Release you? Are you truly upset with me because I would not gaze at you lovingly in front of all my subjects, in front of Prince Eneas and the new autarch? What do you want, man?"
"A sign." He did his best to calm himself. He had a sudden vision of Briony's ladies standing in the hallway with the guards, all of them listening at the door. "Some small sign that the other night meant… something."
Now she came toward him, spreading her arms. "Meant something? Oh, sweet Heaven, how can you ask? Does this mean something?" And as she pressed herself against him her robe fell open and he felt the length of her whole and warm, with only a thin cotton nightdress separating him from her flesh.
He pulled her close and for a long time only held her, squeezing until she could barely find her breath. "Oh, gods, I hunger for you, Briony. I am no poet, no courtier. I have never loved like this before and I do not know the rules of the game! I was frightened because I saw nothing in your eyes. It was as though… I could not…" He shook his head and buried his face in her golden hair, which was still so short he could feel the skin of her neck hot against his cheek. "It was as though everything else we had together… had been a lie."
"Fool, dear fool. I am soon to be a queen. I cannot show people my thoughts in the construction of my face. I would be dead today if I could not hide my feeling from others."
"But there are no others here now," he said, and lifted her chin until he could look into her face, the face he had been able to see only in memory for so long; for a moment it all seemed a dream again, but the feel of her reassured him. "No others. No one but us."
"Then you will see what our love is truly made of," she said, and brought her lips to his.
"Are you well, my love?"
She stirred. "Well, indeed. A little pain, that's all. They say the first time is always that way." She smiled. "You are my man now, forever and ever-the only husband I will ever have, even if a temple never hears our vows. Do you know that?"
"I would be nothing else." He traced circles on the skin of her belly, but could not do so for more than a moment before the urge to kiss her there became overwhelming.
"Stop!" Briony said, laughing. "We cannot! Just think of my ladies-in-waiting, who will be spreading this story all over Southmarch tomorrow morning if I do not bring them back from Merolanna's rooms before midnight."
"I told them it was a matter of grave importance," he said. "Did I lie?"
She smacked at his head and then rolled over so she could kiss him. "Oh, I wish we could be like this forever, Vansen."
"My first name is Ferras," he told her, almost shyly.
"Do you think I don't know?" She laughed again. "I know everything about you that I could discover. At first because I thought you the worst man ever. Later… well, my feelings changed… or at least became clearer." She looked at him, her face suddenly earnest. "Would you prefer I call you by your first name?"
"I don't care which you choose as long as you speak it with that look in your eyes, always," he said.
She rolled onto her back. "But I can't, you know. Not in front of others. You know that, don't you? Please say that you do."
"I suppose," he said. "But how can you love someone so much lower than yourself, that you must hide that love from everyone?"
"Foolish Captain Vansen! I could make you a noble in an instant. I will make you a noble-otherwise, you cannot be my lord constable. But
even so, the way we feel for each other must stay a close-held secret."
"There are no secrets in a place like this-the servants and guards know everything, always." He shook his head. "I can live without marrying you, Briony, although I will die if you marry another… but why must our love stay hidden? Don't you feel the same for me?" He suddenly felt stricken. "You do, don't you? Feel the same?"
"Of course, you wonderful, truehearted man-but I have more than my own happiness to think about. If Kendrick or my father had lived, things would be different. Even if Barrick had not changed so greatly…" She shook her head, her expression darkening like a sky clouding over. "But an ordinary life is not what Fate has given me. I must keep myself aloof, or seem to. I'll have to pretend no man has won my heart… but that any man might, if he brings a useful alliance to Southmarch. That's how I'll make policy. That's how I'll keep our country free from the influence of powerful neighbors."
"Even Syan?" he said suspiciously.
She smiled, but it was a sad one this time. "Even Syan. Especially Syan."
He crept closer to her. "Let us not talk of Syan any more. Kiss me."
When they had done that and more for a while, he sat up.
"Don't go," she said, her voice growing a little slow and sleepy. "I take back what I said. The ladies can find beds in Merolanna's chambers. Tell me more of what you saw down in the caverns. I can scarcely believe any of it. Did you truly fight a god?"
"Not me, no. Not even your brother did. The creature was too far beyond any of us." He shook his head. "I don't want to talk about it. It is still too close."
She shook her head. "It's hard for me even to understand. You say my brother this, my brother that-he fought a hundred men! He swung down on a rope! Some powerful magic must be at work-that is not the brother I knew, who couldn't even cut his own meat without falling to cursing and knocking his trencher on the floor!"