A Man of His Word

by The Complete Series 01-04 (epub)

  “Run more, of course,” he said.

  5

  A hiss of rain rushing over glass died away into petty dripping noises. Logs at the far end of the room spat and spluttered sleepily in the great hearth, and somewhere far off a door was tapping. Rain was a sign of spring, Inos thought happily, and she marveled once more that it should come so soon. For long months yet the iron heels of winter would stamp on poor old Krasnegar, but yesterday she had gathered snowdrops. Flowers! Trees had never impressed her much, but flowers did.

  It was a drowsy do-nothing afternoon and she was curled into a big chair in the library with a book of wide erudition and archaic, inscrutable handwriting. Near the fire Aunt Kade nodded over a slim romance. Various other ladies and gentleman were also pretending to read—few of them seriously. Inos was serious, but about ready to admit defeat. She could ask to have a scrivener transcribe the key passages for her, of course, but she had an inexplicable certainty that she was not supposed to be troubling her pretty little head over this particular tome. The request would not be refused, she thought, but the results might be a long time in coming, and meanwhile the book itself would be unavailable.

  Spring! Summer would arrive in its turn and her ship would be waiting. She sighed and twisted a lock of golden hair and stared at the rain-blurred windows. Krasnegar? To be really honest, she did not long so much for Krasnegar now. She missed her father of course, but who else? There was no one of her rank there, and no one of her age who would understand one word she might say about Kinvale.

  Inos turned to gaze for a moment at Aunt Kade’s drooping eyelids, wondering how she had stood it. Forty years or more she had lived in Kinvale, as wife and widow, and then she had thrown it all up and gone back to Krasnegar to mother a suddenly bereaved niece. A mere niece—a niece who had not appreciated her until she had seen what the old dear had given up. To return to stark and barren Krasnegar for a niece, when Kinvale had offered so much?

  And she? Of course she must go back. She could not doubt it. She would return in the summer, unwed and unbetrothed, apparently.

  Five months since Andor had gone …

  Aunt Kade and her Grace—or Disgrace? —the duchess had run out of candidates at last. The long parade of suitors that had begun with the glorious Andor had ended now with the unspeakable Proconsul Yggingi. Andor had been an accident and Yggingi was a disaster. Yggingi had not been invited to Kinvale for Inos’ sake, Kade had assured her of that quite vehemently. After all, he was twice her age and already married. Unfortunately Yggingi himself did not seem to appreciate such considerations. He was the worst yet, the bottom of the barrel, and not even the official barrel. Any barrel. There were a few pleasant young men in residence at the moment—men who might be allowed to brighten a maiden’s day, if not share her life—but not one of them dared come near Inos now. Yggingi’s menacing glare had walled her off as his private preserve.

  One of the reasons she had fled here, to the library, was to escape the creepy attentions of Proconsul Yggingi. A library was the last place that man was likely to visit.

  How beautifully Andor had read poetry to her!

  None of the others had ever compared to Andor. Of course she had never expected that a lightning strike of romantic passion would be waiting in the clouds. A princess must expect to settle for rank, character, and a purely conventional physical relationship. All she could hope for there was that the man not be totally disgusting. But even being practical, she had found nothing of a size to match her mesh—except Andor. If she discounted him, there was no second best.

  And she must discount him. Five months …

  She raised the book again and made another attempt. A Brief History of the Late and Dearly Mourned Beneficient Sorcerer Inisso, His Heirs and Successors, with an Adumbration of Their Acts and Accomplishments. Dull to the risk of lockjaw, but relevant. A strange man Inisso must have been. Why should he have built his tower on the far shores of the Winter Ocean? Stranger still, why should he have divided his heritage? For it seemed that he had bequeathed each of his three sons an equal share of his magical powers, and apparently that was a most odd thing for a sorcerer to do. There were broad hints here, she had discovered, that some of that magic had been passed down in her own family. She would ask Father about that when she returned. She smiled at the thought of her practical, matter-of-fact father secretly performing sorcerous rituals.

  She had never even had a chance to visit that forgotten chamber of puissance at the top of the main tower. It was curious that she should have found this tattered and dog-eared tome in the library at Kinvale. Very dog-eared—it had been much read over the centuries … By whom? Of course the Kinvale family was also descended from Inisso. She and the droopy-lipped Angilki were related through Inisso, as well as by countless later cross-linkages. So was the sinister Kalkor of Gark, gruesome man.

  Kade had noticed her settling down with the monster volume and had asked what it was. Her first reaction had been approval—Witless Young Maiden Starts Taking Interest—but that had been followed by a strange uncertainty. Inos could not imagine her aunt ever reading such a nightmare of ennui, but knowing Kade, she might very well have a good idea of the gist of it—better than Inos would gain by her studies, likely. What she really needed was someone to discuss it with. But whom?

  The library door swung open on well-oiled hinges to admit a footman, a gawky, baby-faced footman, looking around with large eyes, seeking someone.

  So spring would be followed by summer and Inos would return to Krasnegar with Aunt Kade, and in a year or two they would come back to Kinvale and try again. She was young yet. Andor could not be the only bearable man in the world.

  The rain slapped again, louder than usual, and Inos turned to stare at the windows without really seeing them. Why had the Gods been so cruel? Why produce the perfect candidate before she could understand how incredibly superior he was—and then whisk him away again? He had saved her sanity, of course. He had blazed through Kinvale like a vacationing God. In a few short weeks he had shown her how to live, had demonstrated what life should really be. But comparing Kinvale-with-Andor to Kinvale-without-Andor was almost like comparing Kinvale to Krasnegar. The shadows had returned when he left—not so deep, but emptier. He had sparkled with fun from dawn till exhaustion, a bottomless well of amusement, zest, entertainment, flattery, serious conversation, and—and living.

  Disgusting he was not.

  Five months! Now she knew better. Older and more mature now, she could see that the naive child she had been then could have held no real interest for a man of the world like Andor. But he had taken pity on her and entertained her, cheering her up. Then, when he had seen the juvenile infatuation he had unwittingly provoked, he had found a gentle way to end it. The dramatic post-haste flight into the darkness, the romantic tale of honor and danger—those had been so much kinder than just saying he had more important things to do now, thank you. He had known that she would grow up quickly, and then, when she was mature enough to survive on her own feet—as she now was—then she would see that it had all been a mirage. And all for the best.

  The sound of a cough caught her attention and she looked up to see that the young footman was shifting from one foot to the other in front of Aunt Kade, while wrestling with the terrifying problem of awakening a sleeping princess without coughing hard enough to disturb the other assorted nobility slumped in the nearby chairs.

  Probably the dressmakers had arrived with the gowns for the Springtide ball. Amused, Inos watched to see how the youth would solve his puzzle. In the romances, the correct way to tackle that particular assignment was with a kiss; but if he were to try that in the library at Kinvale, he would very soon find himself being scorched by the breath of the Dragon Herself.

  Even at that age, she thought, Andor would have gone for the kiss and gotten away with it.

  Then he glanced frantically around the room, and his eyes caught hers. She took pity on him and nodded.

  As Andor ha
d taken pity on her. Andor had shown her what she should look for in a suitor—and perhaps done so deliberately, although he had thereby raised her standards so high that they might never be satisfied. The rock of Krasnegar was a tombstone. A man like Andor had all of Pandemia to play in and need not throw away his life in the barrenlands. A princess had duty and obligations. She must live out her days on the rock, but to ask anyone else to do so, just for her sake … For the millionth time, she pondered the ironic truth that a princess lacked some freedoms a common serf could take for granted.

  The footman arrived before her and bowed. She thought this one was the Gavor her favorite coiffeuse spoke of, and if half those stories were true then he was quite a lad. But now he was showing nothing but polite inquiry on a boyishly pink face.

  Inos resisted a temptation to suggest he try a kiss to awaken Kade. She had learned now that excessive familiarity merely unsettled domestics; their life was easier when their place was clearly defined for them. “You can give me the message, and I’ll see that the princess gets it,” she said.

  Gavor, if that was his name, did not try to hide his relief. “That is most kind of you, ma’am! Her Grace requests that both you and your aunt attend her, should it be convenient.”

  Not the Springtide gowns! Inos slammed her book shut with a thump that awoke half the snoozing peers in the room and she flashed the stupid boy a glare that made him blush to the ears. He should have come straight to her, instead of doing all that dithering in front of Aunt Kade—sometimes they just did not seem to have the brains they were born with! But she rose calmly and said merely, “Thank you.” She headed for Aunt Kade. Ekka did not enjoy being kept waiting, and Inos must certainly go around by her own room on the way and brush her hair.

  The dowager duchess’s boudoir—which Inos thought of as the Unholy of Unholies—was a tribute to her son’s peerless taste in decor. It was at once large and light, imposing and intimate. White and gold and powder blue, it bore a heady scent of grandeur and a glitter of pomp, yet nothing obtruded. The walls were paneled in silk within white moldings, the furniture shone in white lacquer trimmed with gilt. Clouds of gauzy lace sheathed the big windows, although that detail always reminded Inos of spiders’ webs. A cheerful crackling blaze in the marble fireplace drowned out the sound of rain, keeping the room uncomfortably warm, soothing old bones.

  Following her aunt in through the door, Inos first saw Ekka herself, straight and tyrannical on one of the high-backed chairs she favored, with her feet placed tight together on an embroidered footstool. Her chair was higher than any of the others, so that she could dominate, as from a throne. One dark-veined hand rested on her cane, exactly vertical at her side. She wore a high-necked, long-sleeved gown of shining ivory satin and her white hair was as flawless as carved and polished marble, incongruous above a desiccated face of weathered walnut.

  Other chairs were arranged in a semicircle before her. Just rising from one was the portly duke, immaculate in aquamarine. He looked worried and puzzled, as if wrestling with some problem, and his drooping lower lip was even wetter than usual. He could not have been sucking his thumb, could he?

  Already on his feet beside him was the obnoxious Proconsul Yggingi, a hard, curt man in his forties. Ugh! His hair was cropped so short that his square head seemed bald, and as usual he was decked out in bronze and leather, from cuirass to greaves. Dancing with Yggingi was like wrestling a water butt. As usual, too, he was clutching his helmet under one arm—perhaps he had a deep fear of earthquakes and did not trust the Kinvale ceilings. Other officers visiting Kinvale did not wear their uniforms all the time. His wife was rarely seen in public, a semi-invalid whose existence he ignored while relentlessly pursuing Inos. His only topics of conversation seemed to be his military career and his unparalleled success at massacring gnomes in a previous posting. He was so detestable that even Aunt Kade could rarely find a good word for him.

  So what had provoked this summons? Inos wondered, as she curtsied to the spiteful old relic on her raised chair, to the ponderous duke, stiffly bowing; curtsying less deeply to the egregious Yggingi; and there was another man, standing by the window, looking out at the—

  Andor!

  The world stopped.

  It was Andor, really Andor. She knew that godlike profile even as he began to turn. He was wearing the same blue doublet and white hose he had worn the first time they met, but now also a long cloak of cobalt velvet trimmed with ermine, sweeping down to silver-buckled shoes. He turned slowly, to look at her, ignoring her aunt and everyone else. His dark eyes fixed on her alone.

  Man as man should be.

  He was thinner, paler … a terrible ordeal? Disaster, or some superhuman suffering, bravely borne? And not over yet, perhaps, for there was vast trouble or sorrow in those unforgettable eyes—none of the bubbling gaiety whose memory she cherished so dearly.

  He paced over to her, while she attempted a smile of welcome and carefully did not gawk like a moron. He took her hands and bowed over them. His eyes had already spoken volumes—regard, pleasure at seeing her … deep sorrow?

  Sorrow?

  And finally he said, “My Princess!”

  “Sir Andor!” She could say nothing more. His princess! Oh, yes!

  Finally Andor acknowledged Kade, swooping her a bow.

  “Sir Andor!” She beamed. “How nice that you can rejoin us!”

  And the old harridan on the high chair had not missed an iota of that reunion, not a crumb.

  “Be seated, ladies!” she croaked in her thin, antique voice.

  Unable to stop staring at Andor, Inos allowed him to lead her to a chair and then watched as he walked over to sit opposite her, gracefully swirling his cloak out of the way as he sat. Kade and the other men had found chairs somewhere.

  What could possibly be so wrong?

  “Sir Andor has brought news for you, Kadolan,” Ekka said.

  “For me, Sir Andor?” Kade was being cautious, her eyes flickering from Andor to Inos and to the others. For her, that was a strange failure of poise.

  “Your Highness,” Andor said, pulling his gaze from Inos, “I am the unhappy bearer of grievous tidings. Your royal brother is … is most gravely ill.”

  Inos heard herself gasp, but Aunt Kade recovered herself at once. Now she knew what was involved, she registered only polite surprise. “You have come from Krasnegar, Sir Andor?”

  He bowed his head slightly. “I have. You will wonder why I did not tell you that it was my destination when I left here, and that omission I must explain to you at length. But I stayed there until almost Winterfest. When I departed, your brother was failing fast.”

  Father! Inos clasped her hands tightly and forgot that this was Andor speaking. Oh, Father!

  Andor glanced at her and then back to Kade. “I have brought a letter from the learned Doctor Sagorn, but he disclosed its content to me. He does not expect his Majesty to recover from this affliction. A few months at the most.” Taking a packet from the pocket of his cloak, he rose and moved over to deliver it.

  Father! Father! Dying? No! No! No!

  Aunt Kade took the letter and held it out at arm’s length to scan the inscription. Then she laid it unread on her lap and folded her hands over it, while Andor swept back to his seat.

  “You think then that we should be prepared to depart on the first ship of spring, Sir Andor?”

  “If the venerable sage is correct, ma’am, that may not be soon enough.”

  The harsh tones of the graceless Yggingi broke in. “Are you suggesting that these gentle ladies attempt the journey overland?”

  Andor gave him a long and inscrutable stare. “That must be their own decision, Excellency. I have known worse journeys.”

  Worse! Inos thought of all the horror stories she had heard and shuddered anew. This marvelous Andor could dismiss that terrible trek so easily?

  “Such as?” Yggingi was scowling at this poised young upstart.

  “The Plain of Bones. Dyre Channel? Ant
hropophagi frighten me much more than goblins do.”

  “You met goblins in the forest?”

  “Twice.” Andor spread his hands and smiled. “I prefer not to discuss their habits in the presence of ladies, but I still have all my fingernails, as you can see. Childish savages, but quite hospitable. My wrestling was rusty, but apparently acceptable—a few sprains was all.”

  Marvelous man!

  “If Princess Kadolan decided to venture this journey, Proconsul,” the duchess asked in her threadbare voice, “Could you provide an escort for her?”

  The big soldier regarded her thoughtfully for a moment. “I have the troops, certainly. The worst of the cold is behind us, but it would still be a test of endurance, even for men. For ladies of quality, it would be a serious ordeal.”

  He stopped and waited.

  “It would certainly be an adventure,” Kade remarked cheerfully. “Inos and I must discuss it when we have read what the skilled Doctor Sagorn has written. We shall keep your generous offer in mind, Excellency.”

  Inos found her mouth hanging open and closed it quickly. That her aunt would even think of such a journey was unthinkable.

  “I am most curious, Sir Andor,” Ekka creaked, “as to why you set out from here for Krasnegar without informing my sister- in-law or her niece of your destination. They would have wanted to send letters.” She bared saffron fangs in a smile that should have frozen his blood.

  Andor acknowledged the point with a token of a nod. “It is not a matter of pride to me, your Grace.” For a moment handsome young man stared up at ugly old woman in what seemed strangely like a contest of wills, but then he continued placidly. “I stupidly placed myself in a grievous conflict of honor. It concerned a promise made to an old friend, one to whom I owe much, a dear friend also of my father’s—”

  “I have forgotten your father’s name and station, Sir Andor.”

  “Senator Endrami, ma’am.”

  Inos resisted a temptation to leap up and cheer. Let them chew on that! An Imperial senator? No lowly adventurer, Andor, but the son of a senator?