The Cup of the World

by John Dickinson

  ‘Trant?’

  ‘Yes. My father is Ambrose, Warden of Trant Castle. Our badge is the Sun and Oak Leaf …’

  Now Phaedra realized that she was being led on. The others were waiting, for …

  Amanthys frowned lightly, as if with an effort of memory. ‘Trant? Oh, yes … Fat and noisy That one.’

  Someone shrieked, and put her hand to her mouth. Others giggled. Phaedra felt herself going red.

  Of course Father was big (and loud); and she would not be surprised if people chose to dislike him. But – but to insult him – and at the same time pretend they barely knew who he was …

  And noisy had not been aimed only at Father.

  ‘My father's fat,’ said Maria. ‘He says it's so he can stand a proper siege.’

  ‘Your father has all the burghers of Pemini paying dues to him,’ said someone else. ‘Unlike some. Warden of Trant! Oh, dear girl. If your father doesn't even own his own roof – then who will want to marry you?’

  ‘Is that all you think about?’ asked Phaedra, with her cheeks hot.

  ‘Fat as a pig,’ another girl murmured. ‘Do all the Trant horses have bowed legs? I wouldn't like to be your mother.’

  That was easy.

  ‘My mother's dead.’

  And it was easier still to walk away.

  The King's castle of Tuscolo was a complex of courtyards and walled enclosures, some vast, others just pockets of stone buildings like the well-court where the girls chattered on about the princes. A short climb up a cobbled ramp and under an archway brought Phaedra, seething with hurt, to the main upper courtyard. The huge space before her was scattered with straw and mess, and busy with many people. To her right the tall keep punched upwards to the sky. To her left was the royal chapel, with its bell towers and long windows. Carved figures massed in their stone niches about and above the chapel doors. A party of monks glided down the broad steps as she approached it. They wore brown robes, with the Lantern badge of their order, and walked in silence through the bustle of the King's house.

  She had seen so many monks in her short stay here. At home there was only Brother David to lift his hands to Heaven and bring its blessing upon the people of Trant. But here the castle and the city beyond it swarmed with monks of all orders. At first she had assumed that Tuscolo was a very holy place. Now she thought that the royal capital must need this many priests because it was really very wicked. She was certainly finding it so.

  The doors of the chapel stood open. In the blue light of the windows statues brooded on the holiness within. Phaedra walked boldly up the long, paved aisle. She bowed to the altar on which stood the Flame of Heaven: the sign of Godhead, bright, formless and unknowable in a world of shadows.

  On this altar the Flame was a great, four-armed thing, far larger than the simple gilt candlestick in the chapel of Trant. Each of its arms was cast in the shape of one of the angels that the Godhead had sent into the world to struggle for souls. And above the altar the same angels reared in four stained-glass windows that dominated the chapel. Michael the Warrior swung his huge sword and grinned, his mouth square in battle-frenzy. Beside him Gabriel the Messenger bent from Heaven with flame upon his wings. Raphael trod an endless road with his staff in hand, and Umbriel looked down with seven eyes and wrote in the book in which all things were written. They were bigger, more garish and less human than in the hangings of home; but Phaedra knew them. She did not feel that she should be shy of them, even here. Under their gaze she felt her anger settle within her, not fading, but going deeper, to places where it would be remembered and yet would no longer tie her tongue.

  After a little she found her way to a bench and sat down.

  People drifted by and glanced at her, but she ignored them and they passed on. Voices rose behind her, coming her way. Men were talking heatedly. She felt no surprise when Prince Barius, dark and angry, stalked past in the aisle with his brother and a half-dozen others at his heel. The party halted barely six feet from her, at a doorway that led to the King's cloisters. No one seemed to notice her.

  ‘In that case, my lord, my father is forsworn whatever course he chooses,’ said Barius. ‘You shall say that to him from me. And say he must now choose either wisely, or well. Many, no doubt, would have him choose wisely. I for one would have him choose well!’

  A chamberlain bowed, and looked to Prince Septimus as if to ask whether he wished to add to his brother's advice. The prince simply nodded, and the men bowed again before hurrying back the way they had come, on the track of some fast-moving matter of state. Barius had already disappeared through the low doorway to the chapel cloisters. Septimus, a man barely older than she was, hesitated for a moment. He had seen her, an unknown girl who must have overheard what the men had been saying. Then he smiled, as if sharing with her the absurdity of what was happening, and followed his brother through the low doorway.

  Footsteps receded, and the chapel was still.

  What was that about? asked Phaedra of the unseen figure on the bench beside her.

  The knight stirred.

  The King is in a dilemma. He must choose between breaking a promise to someone who has influence, and doing the same to someone who has less, but to whom, in the prince's mind, it would be more honourable to stay faithful.

  There was a case in the court this morning, Phaedra told him. They were going to settle it by combat. The King stopped it and said he was going to think.

  No doubt it is that. How do you like the court?

  Not at all. I thought I had found friends, but when I told them what you said about justice they laughed at me.

  You told them the truth. You should not be ashamed of that. How they treat it is their affair.

  Phaedra knew that she was awake, and therefore if she turned to face him he would not be there. But if she looked in front of her, up at the faces of the Angels, she could sense from the corner of her eye the shadowy folds of the black cloak, his dark hair and pale skin, and the huge stone cup that he nursed upon his knees. She knew they were there, for she saw them in her dreams.

  There must be power before there is law, said the knight. And all laws bend to it.

  ‘When shall I see you again?’

  The sound of her own voice startled her. She had not meant to speak aloud. And there was no reply, for now he had gone.

  That night she swept out onto the floor of the throne hall, where the witch had stood alone a few hours before. Again the walls were crowded with people: the knights and nobles of the Kingdom. But this time their women were among them, and this time the eyes were fixed upon her.

  Father paced at her side. Tall, big-bearded, barrel-chested, he trod the aisle towards the throne, and in her heavy brocaded dress she moved in his shadow. Ahead of her, Amanthys and her father were already making their curtsy and bow to the King. Behind her, the voice of the herald was calling the name of the next knight and daughter to come forward. The ceremonies had been underway for more than an hour, beginning with the long rigmarole of the knighting of Septimus, and then of three other young squires. But now, and for a few moments more, it was her turn. The eyes were on her and the whispers were about her, the child of Trant upon her father's arm, with her father's jewels in her hair. She knew that they liked what they saw. She wished that they did not.

  They approached the trio of thrones, and the broad steps that led to them. The King was robed in gold in his place, just as if he had not moved since the morning. The princes, the same courtiers – they were there too. A few paces more: the last yards seemed also to be the slowest. The slightest tug from Father's arm halted her a moment before she expected it. He was bowing. She dropped slowly into her curtsy – long and low, Father had said, and the more of both the better. Now Father was speaking to the King the ritual phrases of introduction that he had repeated to her during their rehearsals. She must stay down.

  Had the witch made a curtsy that morning, before the eyes that had been planning to kill her?

  ‘Greetings, Tra
nt,’ said the soft voice from the High Throne. ‘We have loved your house for its valour in our service. Now we may love it for its beauty as well.’

  And now she could rise and look up into the King's face, which was nothing more than an old man's face framed between a gold robe and a heavy crown. The white hair and beard were thin. She could see the pink of old skin beneath them. She looked into the pale eyes, and saw one eyebrow lifted slightly, as if he was surprised by something he saw.

  ‘And has the beauty of Trant words that it would wish us to hear?’ said the King, after a moment.

  Words? Her?

  Father had not warned her about this!

  She felt his arm tense. He had not been expecting it, either. And surely Amanthys had not been asked to say anything when it was her turn.

  Why her?

  There was only one thing she could say. And she must curtsy again.

  ‘Only my obedience, Your Majesty’ she said, keeping her eyes down.

  ‘Obedience?’ said the soft, old voice. ‘Obedience is good. We know we may look to Trant for that.’

  He must have given some sign then, for as she rose for the second time Father's arm was pulling at hers, drawing her away from the thrones. She looked back. The eyes of Barius still followed her, from the Throne Ochre. Septimus, with his bright gold spurs on his heels, was staring after her, and so were some of the counsellors. But the King was already looking down the hall at the next man and girl to approach him – and the next, and the next. Phaedra was gone from his mind.

  They joined Amanthys and her father, waiting a little to one side of the steps to the thrones. Amanthys was ignoring her, so Phaedra did the same. She looked around the long hall and drew deep breaths to steady her heartbeat, which had been going like a hammer without her being aware of it.

  The walls were lit with the light of the low sun, pouring through the windows. It must be a wonderful, calm evening out there, away from all this throng of people. Up in the gallery where she had been that morning, a group of minstrels were sidling into their places. Below them the court watched the father-and-daughter couples, approaching the thrones in their turn to announce that another girl, and yet another, had crossed the threshold to womanhood. She watched closely to see if the King spoke to any of the daughters. He did not. Why had he spoken to her?

  Septimus was still looking her way. She dropped her eyes quickly.

  The murmurs of the crowd were rising more loudly. Phaedra realized that much of the talk had nothing to do with the formal procession. The faces in the first rank – mainly women – were following the walkers intently, looking for matches for their sons. But behind them men were standing in twos and threes, whispering among themselves. Some were not even pretending to watch. Phaedra saw one man gesturing across the aisle to another, whom she could not see, but who must have been standing in the crowd not far from her. They were arranging to meet. Did they want to discuss marriages already? More likely it was to do with the hearings that had run for days, and must run a day or two yet before all the vanquished rebels had been judged and the loyal men rewarded. They would be talking over the outcomes – perhaps even trying to fix them, as someone had tried so murderously to fix the outcome of the case that afternoon.

  She could sense Father beside her, watching the hall as she was doing. He too seemed to have forgotten the exchange at the thrones. He was itching to be out intriguing among his fellows.

  Now the fifth and last of the couples was joining them, and beyond them the singer of the King had taken his place in the centre of the hall. The strings of the minstrels began to flow with their notes from the gallery overhead. In a high voice the singer began the well-worn opening phrases of The Tale of Kings, which related the coming of Wulfram and his seven sons over the sea to found the Kingdom. Around her, the group of fathers and daughters had begun to break up. Father was already bending to hear what some baron was whispering in his ear. She did not want to talk with anyone. She did not want to stand there, watching the court seethe with politics while the King carried on as if the ceremony was the only business, and all the land was at peace. There was a small door in the wall behind her – half-ajar, because someone had already gone down it. She hesitated. No one was looking at her.

  She knew it would be improper to leave the hall before it was time for the procession to the banquet. Father at least would be angry, if he realized what she had done. But the singer was telling a long version of The Tale, running through the deeds of generation after generation of kings, because the King on the throne wanted to remind everyone how important kingship was. So she would be a prisoner here for an hour or more before the procession began. Others had slipped out, quietly. She would go also, because she dared to.

  Obedience!

  A short passage led to an archway lit by the evening sun. The sound of the ceremonies diminished behind her. She found herself in a little paved court surrounded by old, white colonnades. Low fruit trees grew within its walls. There was a fountain here, its waters lying still in its wide bowl. Phaedra leaned her arms upon it.

  She remembered another fountain, very like this one, in the ruined court outside the walls of her home. She wished that they had never left Trant. She wished that they could be like some other families – including one or two of the greatest – which still held themselves aloof from the court. Why come just to grovel before the King? But Father was a king's appointed warden, and a king's man to his very heart.

  A voice spoke at her elbow.

  ‘Is it that you prefer Wulfram's stones to Wulfram's songs, Phaedra?’

  It was the oldest of the girls who had gone with her to the witch trial, standing alone beside her. She was wearing court dress, so she must have followed Phaedra out of the hall.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I saw you leave. I wondered why’

  Phaedra remembered that her name was Maria. She had a pleasing, oval face, with big eyes and heavy cheeks framed with light-brown hair. Perhaps she had hung back when the others had teased Phaedra that morning. But Phaedra was suspicious, and did not want to risk being laughed at again.

  ‘I like it here,’ she said, as if she had been coming to this fountain for centuries.

  ‘So do I. I thought it could be my private little place in Tuscolo. But of course everybody knows about it. I heard someone say it is the centre of the world.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I imagine they meant that it is the centre of Tuscolo, and therefore of the Kingdom. If that means it's the centre of the world, well … I suppose there must be lands beyond the wild Marches, but nothing comes from them. And Father says there are kingdoms over the sea, but only the mariners of Velis know how to get there, and they will not give away their secrets. Whatever the truth of that, it is certain that this court and fountain were built by Wulfram's sons. So they are as old as the world we know, at least.’

  She was not teasing Phaedra for leaving the ceremony. Indeed, she seemed happy to play truant with her. Perhaps she too had been bored and disgusted in there. But Phaedra did not want to be easily won back. So she observed a dark silence, to show how much she had been hurt by the others that afternoon.

  ‘And the world knows you are a woman now,’ said Maria. ‘Or at least, all of the world that matters. Presented before the King and princes themselves. No one did as much for me. You made an impression up there, I could see. What was it they said to you?’

  Silence did not seem to work as well as Phaedra felt it should.

  ‘I – I was remembering that woman we saw today, on trial,’ she said. ‘I think I must have frowned at the King. He wanted to know why’

  Frowned? She had been scowling, she realized: at the King, who was supposed to be the Fount of the Law!

  ‘Oh, Angels!’ Maria laughed. ‘And what did you say?’

  Phaedra shrugged. She felt ashamed of what she had said.

  ‘The others will have fits when I tell them—’

  ‘Please don't,’ Phaedra
said firmly.

  ‘Oh dear. Well, I shall not then. And I'm sorry if we upset you, Phaedra. I thought it was all nonsense, too.’

  ‘They said we weren't good enough,’ Phaedra said, hoping she would be told at once how high and noble Trant was and that its wardens were respected throughout the Kingdom (although Father's grandfather had himself been a dog-knight, of course).

  ‘Good enough for what? If they meant marrying a prince, you've no less chance than the rest of them. You have looks. And Trant is a big name: one of the seven, even if it is not your father's of right. Whatever you did back there, I'd say Septimus was quite struck with you. He was looking your way just now, all the while that they were presenting those other girls.’

  ‘I didn't notice,’ said Phaedra, who had.

  ‘I did, and I doubt that I was the only one. But in truth, it is only the most powerful families who can count the odds of an alliance with the crown. They keep their daughters and cousins and nieces muffled away behind lace and locked doors against the prospect – poor things. Prince Barius is an impressive man, but he thinks of little beyond his devotions. He would much rather have been a monk, you know …

  ‘Of course marrying princes is a dream, Phaedra. We have to dream. We have to put a face on tomorrow. You should be sorry for us, not angry. And sorry for yourself, too. Do you know what – or rather who – will be waiting for you when you return home?’

  ‘No one. I'm not going to marry’

  She heard Maria sigh, softly.

  The last sunlight played on the waters at the centre of the world. In the branches of the fruit trees, doves cooed loudly at the coming dusk.

  ‘I've a cousin almost the same age as you,’ Maria said, in a dreamy tone as if she was talking to herself. ‘She has just passed her fifteenth birthday. She was a lovely, happy girl until this summer. Now she is shut up in a room at home, fed thinly and beaten each day, because she says she will not wed the man my aunt thinks it good that she should. And wed him she will, unless he tires of waiting for her spirit to be broken and seeks elsewhere. I hope my father will not use me so, in my turn. But he has ambitions and is waiting for a good chance. And when he has made up his mind, my fortune, rights, purpose, will be my husband's …