The Poison Throne

by Celine Kiernan

  Lorcan’s mouth twitched and his eyes sparkled at her when he said, “Aye, they’re a bloody pain in the arse.”

  She gave him a dry eye. “Ah, stop it,” she said.

  “You can do it, baby-girl.” He nodded at her, his eyes solemn. “You’re fit. And it’s just for one day. I’ll be with you tomorrow.”

  Wynter looked at his white lips and tired face, and nodded uncertainly. “I know you will, Dad.”

  “Go on then.”

  She took a deep breath, flexed her hands, straightened her back and left.

  There was activity at Razi’s door as Wynter exited her suite, and she pretended to check something in her belt purse, watching the proceedings from the corner of her eye.

  It was the tailor, delivering a neatly folded stack of purple coats. Razi was accepting them as though they were a basket of adders. He nodded to dismiss the man and then stood watching him leave, his face tight, the pile of coats in his arms. The steam from Christopher’s bath was billowing past him into the corridor, and it gave Razi the look of a rangy god, descending through clouds.

  A page was waiting and he cleared his throat until Razi turned his hooded eyes to him. “His Majesty, the Good King Jonathon, wishes to remind your Highness that your presence is required in the council room at the second half of the eighth quarter.”

  “Tell his Majesty that I will be otherwise occupied.”

  The page seemed to be expecting this reply and handed over a note, sealed with Jonathon’s crest. Razi’s jaw twitched, and he shifted his burden of coats and took the note, breaking the wax seal and snapping the paper open with one hand. Rapidly scanning the missive, his breathing quickened and his face flushed as he read the message.

  The page looked steadfastly at the wall while Razi ground his teeth and made a visible effort to suppress his rage. Eventually, he managed to grind out a terse, “I shall attend.”

  The page snapped off a relieved bow and hurried away.

  Wynter stopped fiddling with her purse and moved casually up the hall. “Your Highness,” she said, her tone formal but her expression soft. Razi snapped his eyes to her and she saw that he was barely in control of his emotions.

  “How fare you?” she asked lightly, her eyes saying more.

  He handed her the note. It was very brief. Written in Jonathon’s elegant hand, it simply read, The Inquisitor General requests that the Freeman Christopher Garron, Hadrish, remain available for further discussion. It was signed “Jonathon Kingsson III”.

  Wynter re-folded it carefully and looked up into her friend’s face. Within Razi’s rooms there was the sound of gentle splashing. Christopher’s ruined clothes lay in a heap at their feet, the smell nauseating despite the medicinal steam that filled the air.

  Wynter swallowed hard. Though he was staring at her, she didn’t think Razi was seeing her at all, it was as though he were scanning some invisible interior landscape, peopled by predators and shadowed by horrors that only he could see. He clutched the coats against his chest, creasing the carefully pressed brocades and crushing the velvet collars.

  Wynter put the note on top of the coats. “You’re creasing them,” she said, and she pulled his hand gently to loosen his crushing grip on the expensive cloth. Razi focused on her then and despite the guards, she kept holding his hand and looking up into his face, giving him a rare, unguarded public smile of affection.

  Razi breathed out a sigh and smiled back, squeezing her fingers, his face pained. He went to say something, and then he frowned. He looked down sharply at her hand. He looked over her shoulder at the watching guard. He looked at her face. Then he glanced around suddenly at the very public hall, and he snatched his hand away from hers.

  The note wobbled and dropped from the coats to the floor and Wynter bent to retrieve it and replaced it on the pile. When she looked back up at him, Razi’s expression had completely changed.

  His eyes were hooded, his face cold. He was standing very straight, his posture remote. “This must end,” he said firmly.

  Wynter wasn’t sure what he meant. “I will see you tonight,” she assured him.

  “No,” he said, and stepped back, putting his hand on the door handle. “I shall be otherwise occupied.” And he shut the door in her face without looking at her again.

  She stood for quite a long moment, looking at the dark panelled wood of the door, Razi’s last words a little seed of ice in her chest. There was silence from within the suite, no sounds at all. No conversation. Wynter knew that Christopher’s bath was just to the right of the door, in front of the fireplace. Had Razi spoken to him, even quietly, she would have heard the murmur of their voices, but there was nothing. Razi must have either been standing, motionless and silent on the other side of the door. Or he had passed by his friend and gone into the other room without a word.

  Goddamn you, Razi Kingsson, she thought and the strength of bitterness in her heart caught her by surprise. Goddamn you and your damned secrets and your pushing people away. She kicked the door childishly, and then laid her hand against the wood. Come back, she thought. Come back out and give me a hug.

  But he didn’t, of course, and she eventually patted the door gently, as she would have liked to pat Razi’s shoulder, and made her way down to the library.

  Wynter stood outside the library with her heart hammering in her chest and her cheeks ridiculously red and hot. Her tools felt unbearably heavy on her shoulder. She wasn’t going to be able to do this! She just wasn’t!

  She thought about the cluster of gangling apprentices that were bound to be on the other side of the door and felt her stomach roll like a carp in a jug. She was quite certain that she was going to open the door, stumble, trip, fall, fart and then puke.

  Wynter slapped herself in the face, hard enough to bring tears of pain to her eyes. She took a sharp breath and held it. Exhaling slowly, she opened the door and stepped into the room. She didn’t look around her until she’d carefully shut the door. At the click of the latch she was suddenly in control. Her cheeks were cool, her tongue was loose and able, her belly was calm. She raised her eyes to the small knot of youths in front of her and took them in with one cool sweeping glance.

  There were five of them. Two first years, two third years, and one fourth year apprentice like herself. None of them were chartered for the green, in fact all but the fourth year lad wore only basic black laces, and none of them had guild approval for wages. They were, for the most part, the usual rough-looking, sly-eyed bunch. They turned as one to stare at her, at first with surprise and then with sneering laughter. The older boys eyed her with undisguised lechery.

  “What we got here then?” crowed a slim, shock-haired fellow, looking at her crotch and licking his lips. “This a bloody joke or what?”

  “Who told yer you could wear them clothes?” asked one of the small first years, his peaky little face sharp with accusation.

  Wynter swallowed. She knew that their master was here, lurking in the stacks somewhere, pretending not to notice that she’d arrived. He would be listening to how she handled his boys, using it as a measure of her worth. This was make or break for her in terms of how she would get on with his team, she had to get this right, because there’d be no second chances.

  “Mebbe she’d be here to give us some relief,” laughed the shock-haired boy and his eyes roamed over her breasts. His companions whooped and knocked each other about in crude delight, though the smallest one couldn’t have been more than seven or eight.

  She ignored this coarse opening volley and looked each boy up and down with slow, cold deliberation. She had already taken in everything she needed to know about them, but now she was using her father’s old trick of marking each boy and dismissing him as unimportant. She passed over the first years as if they were thoroughly beneath her contempt and turned her attention to the third year apprentices.

  Wynter purposely started with the one who had first spoken to her, the foul-mouthed, shock-haired boy. She looked pointedly into his f
ace, down to the guild mark on his tunic and then to the black laces in his boots. When she got to his laces, she allowed her eyebrows to lift a little as if to say, oh, is that all?

  Then she did the same to his companion, a raw-boned, freckle-faced lad with striking blue eyes and crooked front teeth. He frowned at her scrutiny and glanced at the fourth year boy for support. Wynter had already realised that the older boy was the one she’d need to deal with, but first she made a show of glancing at the third year’s laces and dismissing him with a tut. Only then did she turn her attention to the important fourth year lad.

  He was of medium height, a stooping fellow of about seventeen, with a round good-natured face and a head of silky brown hair, clubbed, as was befitting his status, at the nape of his neck. He had stayed watchfully in the background as his companions had jostled and pucked and leered, and now he was regarding her with careful interest. She took in his face, the guild mark, his boots. She allowed her eyebrows to rise approvingly at the yellow colour of his laces, and let herself nod. A good grade, only one level down from the green. She let her eyes meet his, and caught him flicking a glance down to her guild approval pendant. His lips twitched and he met her eyes, his face guarded.

  “I’ve no doubt your master has left you excellent instructions, and that you are hard at work on his behalf,” Wynter said, speaking directly to him and only him. “I’m sorry to have interrupted you. Please, I beg you, continue with whatever tasks he charged you to perform. My master is most eager that we make progress.”

  This put a large burden on the boys. If their master had not left any instructions, then it implied that he was lazy and incompetent and that his early absence from the workplace was a great dereliction of duty. Wynter knew that apprentices were unruly and insubordinate to a boy, but loyal beyond belief to their master. For these boys to continue their larking now would be a bad reflection on the man who supplied them with their bed and board, and on whom their futures depended. It would also shame him in front of another master’s apprentice.

  The fourth year sucked his teeth for a minute and examined her face, a small frown growing between his eyebrows. “Why ain’t yer master here himseln?” he asked.

  The shock-haired fellow leapt in, his tone suddenly earnest and inquiring. “I heard Lord Moorehawke don’t support this mortuus in vita thing! I heard he ain’t even been to no banquet or nothin’ since that pagan Arab bastard been taken to the throne! That’s why he ain’t here, ain’t it?”

  Wynter opened her mouth to reply, but the other third year interrupted her. He had a surprisingly cultured voice and he looked her up and down when he said, “My mother said the Lord Razi has put a spell on the King. That he has bewitched his way to the throne…”

  “Sure his ma did bewitch her way to Jonathon’s bed when the King were but a lad!” squeaked one of the first years.

  “He shook her off quick enough,” sneered the shock-haired lad, “Black-eyed bitch! Didn’t take long for the King to come to his right mind and get himseln a decent Christian woman ’afore ’twas too late.”

  “Not ’afore that brown bitch pushed out a bastard, though! And she murst have cast another spell on him now, for harn’t he tossed out his golden boy for that black devil?”

  “Bloody brown heathen.”

  Wynter felt her head spinning. Their voices were all blending into one great rush of hate, and she felt her control of the situation draining away. It was like listening to Northlanders talk! Decent Christian woman? Pagan Arab bastard? When had religion and race ever been an issue in this kingdom? When had they started talking about spells and bewitchings as though they were something to be reckoned with?

  The fourth year was speaking to her, and she forced herself to concentrate on his wary, thoughtful voice as he said, “I suppose we have ter replace his Royal Highness, the Prince Alberon, with the Arab bastard, do we? Scrape out the true heir and carve in the pretender?”

  Wynter blinked at him, her heart scurrying in her chest. Her eyes felt dry and hot. She moved her tongue around in her mouth to try and get it wet enough to speak. When she did finally get something out, she was shocked at how even her voice was, how reasonable her words.

  “My master is detained with business of state,” she said. “That is why he cannot attend us today.” She drew a note from her jacket, making sure that the crowding boys could see Lorcan’s crest on the wax seal. “I have a note from him for your master.” The fourth year looked from it to her, his face neutral. “And if you examine the carvings on these walls,” she continued, “You will see that there will be no need to replace the prince with his brother. Lord Razi is, in fact in all of these pictures already. He is in more of them than even the Royal Prince Alberon, as Lord Razi was born first and was here longer.”

  The boys frowned and glanced around them. Wynter realised suddenly that none of them knew what either Alberon or Razi looked like. To these boys, her two friends were just names, one representing a brown bastard, one representing a golden boy. That was all, just names, just icons. And with this revelation she understood the true depth of what Jonathon was going to achieve here.

  By erasing Alberon from history, by destroying every reference to him, every picture of him, every carving, Jonathon could make whatever he wished of Alberon’s memory. Alberon could become anything – a gibbering imbecile, a lunatic, a murderous lout, a dangerous tyrant. Jonathon could make anything of Alberon, because most of his people had never even seen him, had never known his face or the truth of his character. Poor Albi. Soon he would be nothing, or worse, he would be remade into a monster.

  Jusef Marcos’s last words came back to her in a rush: His Highness the Royal Prince Alberon! It was Prince Alberon! He sent the word, my Lord! He sent the word that I kill you. She could not reconcile herself to that. Could not impose her image of the wild, grinning, impulsively affectionate Alberon, bounding and sunny, with that of an evil, scheming man, hidden in the shadows, dispatching assassins intent on the murder of his own beloved brother. She felt tears threatening and bit her tongue and looked again at the group of boys who were still staring about them, trying to figure out who was who in the numerous carvings that filled the room.

  Wynter took a deep breath and said harshly, “So, what work did your master leave you?”

  The shock-haired boy sneered at her, “What business be it of yourn, wench?”

  The fourth year slapped him suddenly on the back of the head, “Tat it, Jerome. Get yer roll to the back stacks and start on that frieze, as what yer were told.”

  Jerome gaped at his companion for a second. The fourth year held his eye, and eventually the other boy blushed deep and moved off to the large stacks. The other third year drifted away, and the two small first years dithered, hopping from foot to foot as if they needed to piss.

  “What are we meant to do, Gary?” whined one of them.

  The fourth year rolled his eyes to heaven. “Why doesn’t yer ever listen, yer little maggots? Get yer to them little shelves over there and lay out yer tools and I’ll be with yer now.” The two boys scampered off, and Wynter heard them pushing and giggling as they made their way to the smaller book cases.

  The fourth year, Gary, looked at her, his face solemn. He spoke to her in a low voice, and Wynter thought she heard a heavy measure of sympathy in his voice. “It pains me ter do this work,” he said honestly. “Yer master has done some right excellent beauty here. ’Tis a sin ter wipe it.”

  She looked into his gentle eyes and said nothing. He grinned at her with a mouth full of rotten teeth. “You done well with them lads,” he said and she let a little smile touch her eyes. “I’ll take yer ter my master, eh?”

  Wynter nodded and Gary led her through the stacks to where Pascal Huette had been biding his time. He was a small man, wiry and grey, his face angular, his pale eyes gleaming from a complex nest of wrinkles. During the course of the day, Wynter would come to realise that his apprentices adored him and that Gary was, in fact, his son.

>   They spend most of the next few hours walking through the friezes and picture panels, as Wynter described what it was her father wanted done. Pascal had at first assumed that they were replacing Alberon and Oliver with some object – a tree, a horse, something to fill in the gaps. When Wynter explained that Lorcan just wanted the figures planed down to the blank wood and left as a gaping hole in the picture, an obvious and glaring absence, Pascal looked at her thoughtfully.

  “He wants no additions?”

  “No, Master Huette.”

  “Naught to disguise the gaps?”

  “No.”

  She produced the letter and handed it to him, waiting patiently while he read it, which he did slowly and with difficulty.

  When he’d finished, Pascal folded the paper and looked around the room. “God help us,” he sighed. “’Tis a bloody crime I’m partaking in. But it will be done, lass, and done well. Your master can trust us.”

  “He fully expects to join you tomorrow, Master Huette, and we will work by your side.”

  Pascal looked at the floor, sucked his teeth in a gesture he shared with his son, then glanced at her again. “Lorcan don’t really support this here travesty, do he, lass? He can’t possibly believe it right that the Arab take the throne?”

  Wynter looked at his kind eyes and pondered his oblique manner. Who can you trust? she thought, who but yourself? Pascal Huette may well have been kind, but he could also be foolish. He may seem versed in the subtleties of court, but what if he was incapable of keeping a secret? It was obvious that Lorcan respected this man, but still, she noted, he had not trusted him enough to tell him of his illness. Her reply was quiet and bland, “My father will do his duty to the King, Master Huette.”

  Pascal nodded, looked her up and down, and flicked his gaze to where Gary was bent over a shallow frieze. It was a long, flowing, exuberant panel, Alberon running his hounds after a fox, the carving as full of life and joy as the boy himself had been. Gary was carefully shaving Alberon’s figure from the wood, his sweeps slow and meticulous so as to preserve the beautiful work her father had done on the hounds and the surrounding foliage. Pascal Huette watched his son for a moment, his face sad.