"Another noble to keep an eye on. The Count enjoys close ties with Stranth Tor and Orvanthe."
"How am I ever going to keep track of all my foes?” despaired Lindan.
Devorna bolstered him with a heartier smile. “With my help."
"But you remain in mourning."
"Life goes on. I miss your father terribly and will grieve for him until the end of my days, but you are his legacy. Anarica needs a ruler with a firm hand and behind every great man is a greater woman. Yours just so happens to be your mother."
That did not sit comfortably with Lindan, who was after all an adolescent male harboring the usual thoughts of independence by cutting the apron strings. Sadly for him, freedom was a luxury denied the members of royalty.
"Promise me something, my son,” beseeched the princess.
"Anything for you, mother."
"Don't marry late in life. Never bothered by the age gap between Jannus and me, his loss is almost unbearable. Wed while young and get the most from marriage."
"Mother, I'm sixteen! I entertain no notion of settling down.” Lindan shrugged. “Besides, I don't know any girls."
"I can resolve that,” promised Devorna, matchmaking long a sideline of hers. Handmaidens at court prowled ceaselessly for future husbands, the Prince Mother happily fixing up likeminded co-workers of the palace staff. Fussing over him, she chided, “Sit up straight, dear. How can I find you a wife with you slouching like that."
The banquet came to an enforced close around midnight when the Housecarls escorted the drunker revelers to the stream of carriages pulling up in the courtyard, prompting those lingerers left to vacate the emptying dining hall. Standing by the imposing doors at the end of the marbled corridor, Lindan courteously bade his departing guests goodnight, Sollerd Widham oddly not the last to be politely evicted. The Prince Mother had gone to her bed, leaving Drey Wynsorr at her son's elbow to assist dispensing the formal farewells, choking on his civility. Cringing on the doorstep from the showery weather now turned into a full blown rainstorm, the whacked prince cheekily wished Ormish Savanth a safe journey by hoping that his armor did not rust in the wet. The glower he got back from the old baron informed him better than words that his parting shot was just another missile fired in the long running skirmishes punctuating realm politics.
Moseying down the corridors to the royal apartments after the middle-aged chancellor tottered off to bed, Lindan lingered outside his mother's door and decided against intruding upon her misery. In the space of four short weeks Princess Devorna lost the two males closest to her in life: a husband entombed forever in the chill family crypt, her unready little boy crowned a man.
Subjected to alarming insight, Lindan grew aware that he had yet to grieve for his dead father; a lapse understandable in light of his whirlwind ascension to power and the pomp imposed on him by the transition. The reality was less forgiving. Jannus fathered his only child and sole heir in his mid-fifties. Scarcely having much time or energy to devote to raising a son, that chore was left in the lap of his wife and her attendants. To Lindan his sire took on the persona of an estranged figure more in the nature of a visiting uncle: standoffish, but respected. Obliged to mourn a man who was in effect a distant relative troubled the prince. His very own father should mean more to him than that.
"Is everything alright, Highness?"
The brooding youth glanced sharply about, glimpsing Captain Dikor striding towards him from the library end of the lamped hallway. Did the man never sleep!
"Today went fairly well, Prince Lindan. None of the esteemed nobles broke out dueling in fisticuffs and there was not one assassination attempt made on your life.” Starf displayed an impish grin from ear to ear when stating that.
Lindan could not help but smile back and chortle, opening the polished oak door to his candlelit chambers. “Thanks for the levity, captain."
"Sleep well, My Prince,” Starf said and carried on making his final rounds.
Disrobing, Lindan tiredly flung his crown and mantle on to the back of an armchair fronting the cheerily crackling fireplace and crossed the thick maroon pile carpeting the sitting room into the bedchamber. Flopping onto the giant four-poster bed capable of sleeping an entire family with room to spare, he stared listlessly up at the alabaster ceiling. Sumptuously appointed, his apartment projected a homelier feel than the more formal areas of the palace due to its coziness and the handful of oil paintings rendered by faceless artists that brought a splash of rainbow brightness to rooms otherwise slavishly decorated in the mandatory royal color scheme: crimson drapes and furnishings set against marbled white.
Eyes drooping, Lindan embraced the welcome end to a long and wearying day. But before sleep cosseted him in blissful blackness, swirling clouds of color niggled his drowsing brain behind flickering eyelids. He loathed red. Why could the carpet not be green or yellow? He liked green.
Next day Lindan went against the wishes of his chancellor and postponed his first actual day of running the realm. Following Jannus peacefully passing away in his sleep a month earlier, Drey Wynsorr had taken care of the daily business that cropped up in managing a monarchy. But the princedom lacked a figurehead, making Drey upset at the new sovereign discarding his regal duties so lightly.
"I'm not asking you to be happy about it,” Lindan told him in the morning, rising to dress in an unadorned blue tunic complimented by grey hose. “Just arrange matters as I've instructed. My dealing with greedy merchants angling for trade concessions will simply have to be put off. We have a more important issue to address."
"As Your Highness commands,” Drey said rather affectedly.
Lindan breakfasted with his mother in her quarters. High winds dispersed the night's rain, pleasing sunshine streaming through the sitting room window from out of a sky washed clean and blue. The brand new Prince of Men savored the postcard view from the arched panes, idly watching the white triangular sails of fishing smacks bobbing on the choppy waters of the lake as the fisher folk plied their trade.
"Haven't you a realm to govern?” Devorna asked between sips of lemon tea while a servant cleared away the breakfast trays.
Turning his gaze from the vista, Lindan noted her departing food was untouched. “I'm boss now, mother. I can be late for work, if I so choose."
"That is not setting a good example. Punctuality may not seem all that important, but tardiness smacks of sloppiness and you can ill afford to be seen as lax. As monarch you are untried, my son. From the outset of your reign you must rule strongly."
Not in the mood for an extended lecture on monarchical duties, Lindan elected not to argue. Waiting for the maid to leave the room, he broached a dilemma plaguing him since yesterday afternoon. “Just how much of a threat are the Widhams to the security of the throne?"
Devorna set down her teacup on its saucer; a delicate vessel of hand-painted china part of a service in the Holbyant family for generations. “My, that's a weighty question for so early in the day. What brought this on?"
"Meeting the Duke of Karavere."
"Sollerd is rather slimy,” the Prince Mother conceded.
"Drey reckons he has designs on the crown."
"The Chancellor is a worrywart. People handling vast sums of money tend to overtly fret. It's no secret that Sollerd lusts after the throne, but he's in no position to act on his covetous impulses. His duchy is strategically weak."
"Even with the Coastal Guard at his disposal?"
"A seagoing force only, my son. You command the Royal High Army. Any tussle for the principality will come down to decisive land battles and we boast superior numbers."
"You sound like a general,” Lindan wryly observed.
"Often when your father was busy with the affairs of state and I grew bored with ladylike pursuits, I passed the time with Captain Dikor discussing soldiering tactics. It was a refreshing change of pace from needlepoint. He's quite an expert on the subject of the army."
"Starf should be. He did graduate the military academ
y at the top of his class."
"You've done your homework. That's good to hear. Learning the background of friends and rivals is essential to political survival. So you should already know that Ittoria Coramm represents a greater threat to the stability of your rule than the other nobles combined."
"Her Lancers do form the cavalry component of my army,” he acknowledged. “Without a horse unit our soldiers lack mobility."
"There's more to it than simple horsepower. The Stranth is the breadbasket of Anarica. Supplying us with wheat and meat, the Horse Lady could conceivably starve the rest of the realm if so inclined. Her family's long resented the fact we Holbyants wrested the crown from them. But their ongoing animosity for the Widhams keeps both fiefs preoccupied enough to forestall any serious plotting against us."
Lindan reflected on his mother's astuteness. Holbyant penned history books attested that the longstanding feud between the Karaveren duchy and Strantharian marquisate arose when the twentieth Coramm prince, an heirless boy-man, was assassinated, the culprit rumored to have been a hired killer in the pay of the Widhams. Disregarding the absence of conclusive proof, Stranth Tor waged undeclared war on Port Karavere, plunging the principality into two years of bloody strife. The Anarican Civil War was only resolved when the then chancellor, a Calbraith Holbyant, seized the throne with the unilateral backing of the royal soldiery, putting an end to the costly dispute by restoring order and forcibly bringing peace to the fractured realm. Faced with no choice but to accept a Holbyant princedom, the deposed Coramms and thwarted Widhams cemented the cessation of hostilities by jointly signing the historic Impasse Junction. Funny how a little piece of parchment pacified the warring Horse and Ship Lords, compelling them to pledge allegiance to Prince Calbraith.
"I'm surprised father didn't find a way to reconcile them,” Lindan mused aloud. “He was a master of diplomacy."
"But not a magician."
That prompted Lindan to get going. Devorna went to stand and he gallantly pulled out his mother's chair for her. Leaving the table to recline on a plush divan near the sunlit window, she fastidiously smoothed out the folds wrinkling her black dress, reaching afterwards for the slim book of melancholic poetry put down on the settee the night before.
"Mustn't put off the inevitable,” announced Lindan. Devorna tapped her cheek and he lightly kissed his mother goodbye. Frowning, he asked, “Aren't you going to supervise my opening day in office?"
Flicking to the page she had marked with a ribbon, the reading Prince Mother replied, “No dear. I'm sure you and Drey can manage fine without me. Just try not to have anyone hanged for treason on your first day."
Exiting, Lindan marched down the corridor to his father's, now his, study: a circular room shelved with books and permeated by the musty smell of history. Perusing the rows of catalogued tomes, he eyeballed a set of annals wearing black and gold jackets collecting dust on a lower shelf. Picking out the first of those thick volumes and seating himself at the square reading table occupying the center of the family library, Lindan read the book from cover to cover, brushing up on the minor interracial border disputes marring Terrathian history. Done with that, he started scouring the amassed literature for references to wizards with scant success. A polite rapping on the door around midmorning preceded Drey Wynsorr poking his gaunt face into the room.
"Ah, Prince Lindan, here you are. Everyone is assembled where you wanted them, waiting for you to make an appearance."
Lindan glanced up over the book he was poring over. “That was quick, Chancellor."
"Efficiency is my middle name, Highness."
"I thought it was Ollephus.” Pushing back from the small table cluttered with all manner of historical and encyclopedic hardbacks, the monarch quit the study and set off smartly down the hallway, Drey hot on his heels. “You say everyone is there,” he said over his shoulder.
"Excepting Blain Embah. He's off in the city somewhere on SHIC business, having left the palace well before sunrise. I've not bothered sending a messenger after him. A spy isn't the easiest person in the world to find."
Lindan fumed. He was relying on Arrow's presence at the advisory meeting he had called. “Find Starf Dikor. Have him report to my mother. I need her kept busy for the next few hours.” Responding to the chancellor's quizzical look, the regent explained, “She confided that she and the captain of the Housecarls often spend time together."
"Highness! That is hardly proper behavior befitting an officer of his standing and a woman of her virtue."
"Don't be so prissy, Drey. She enjoys Dikor's company solely for his conversation. They evidently share a passion for things military."
"But she's the Prince Mother."
"I know. Go figure."
Turning into the empty throne room devoid of its usual courtiers, the prince strode past his golden, glittering seat of power over to the unassuming white timber door set in the marbled back wall. It was ajar and Lindan stepped through the doorway into the antechamber beyond.
Surprisingly roomy, the windowless and rectangular office had an ambiance less clinical than the vaulted hall without. Mahogany paneling decorated the walls and low-slung ceiling with the reddish-brown warmth of lumber milled from Jungular Forest at the southern extremity of the realm. Flickering oil laps recessed into the varnished panels furnished light, illuminating the two men who had jumped to their feet off high-backed leather chairs placed around an oval table. One was a fellow expensively attired in a flowing robe of white silk trimmed with gold, the other a soldier uniformed in high-ranking officers garb.
"Be seated, gentleman,” Lindan said cursorily, closing the door after him. Crossing the room, he eased into the seat fronting a colorfully inked parchment map of Terrath pinned to the burnished panel behind. “Thank you both for coming so promptly. I appreciate that you are busy men."
"That's quite all right, Lindan. I'm curious to know just what impels you to summon the head of the church and commander of the army to the palace on such short notice."
Lindan smiled indulgently at the familiarity of the robed spiritual leader of Anarica. Presbyter Jhonra was a sprightly 80-year-old baldpate, his chin hosting a beard dyed black curling down to his knees. His spotless, hooded robe bore an embroidered red X above the left breast, while gracing his neck on a silver chain dangled a solid example of that instantly recognizable symbol of the State Church denoting his exalted position in the clergy hierarchy. Jhonra had baptized the newly installed Prince of Men, overseen Lindan's religious education throughout his all too brief childhood, and stayed a close friend and confidant of the Holbyant family, earning the old presbyter the right to be informal when in private with the royals.
The man opposite the clergyman on Lindan's right was a study of formality, sitting straight-backed with a practiced rigidity stemming from twenty-eight years of unbroken military service. In his mid forties, Marshal Enoh Toombe's golden breastplate marked his prestigious rank and experience, underlined by the graying temples of his short-cropped mud brown hair.
"First off,” began Lindan, “I thought Marshal Toombe and I could meet in a less pompous atmosphere than when introduced at my coronation ceremony. I haven't had the chance to become acquainted with half the realm's prominent figures. It's hard getting to know someone when perched high up on the throne and, going by your service record, you are somebody worth knowing, Marshal. Enlistment in the army at sixteen; the first commoner enrolled for officer training at the academy, graduating with full honors; making general when only thirty-five. That makes impressive reading."
"Your Highness is too kind.” Enoh sounded mildly unflattered. It was common knowledge he held a low opinion of the highborn.
"What's this all about?” pressed Jhonra, heading off any possible contention. Far from being naïve, the young prince was unprepared to deal with the reality that the Royal High Army did not blindly serve the crown. Politics ran rampant in the military too.
"Down to business then,” said the royal. “I have it
on good authority that trouble is brewing out West."
"Is Eflam Khun up to his old tricks again?” questioned the presbyter.
Enoh Toombe snorted. “When isn't he?"
"I don't follow, Jhonra,” professed Lindan.
"Every so often the Count of Serepar stirs up trouble between Alberion and the eastern territories. Call it his hobby. Usually something minor and harmless, his last practical joke saw the draught horses that pull the royal carriage replaced by miniature ponies. Lancers ranged all over the Stranth for those dwarf horses and ended up supplying them to the crown stables free of charge under the guise of a contrived equine levy in the form of a cleverly forged letter. They weren't happy to say the least. I'd like to get my hands on the forger responsible for penning that requisition. He signed your father's name beautifully.” That was no idle wish. As well as performing ecclesiastical duties, Jhonra chaired the bench of the Royal Court of Justice as Prime Judge. Sentencing lawbreakers was his pastime.
"It's something rather more serious than playing pranks on the crown. I'm talking about an inaugural race war."
The presbyter paled at the news. Enoh Toombe looked staunch and unflappable.
Lindan stared curiously at the marshal. “You don't seem at all surprised."
"It merely confirms why the Western Transgression Alliance was formulated. Never peaceable neighbors, it was only a matter of time before the Goblins jump the boundary fence in force."
"That's a philosophical attitude for a soldier, Enoh Toombe,” mused Jhonra, the color returning to his face. “Considering you're talking about heathens."
"The Carnachians aren't all mindless child killers, Your Eminence. A few are actually competent tacticians. We should never underestimate them."
"Are you speaking from experience?"
Indulging the prince's interest, Enoh made known, “I was blooded in the battle for Holler Ridge when but a greenhorn foot soldier.” Seeing the boyish intensity in Lindan's face, he expounded, “A forgettable border clash you won't read about in any book, Highness, because we lost to Goblins. Westies may seem at first glance disorganized rabble, yet I found them to be the ablest of fighters."
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