by Anna Kendall
In fact, The Queendom was a series of rings nestled inside each other. The widest was the distant, three-sided curve of mountains and hills. Then came a vast ring of plains, fields, pastures, and—although I could not see them now—the smaller villages through which Hartah had wandered. Closer in was this sprawling web of connected villages, curiously devoid of shops or alehouses, which circled an island in the wide River Thymar. And on the island was the capital city of Glory.
The entire island was ringed by a high, thick stone wall that came right to the water’s edge. Soldiers patrolled the ramparts. Huge iron gates, now all raised, were set into the wall. Wide, high stone bridges connected the riverbanks to the island. Other gates had no bridges but instead docks, to which barges came and went on the placid waters of the river. In some places, the circling island wall seemed to project out over the river, which I didn’t understand.
The only thing visible beyond the city wall was a single slender tower, soaring several stories high and dotted with narrow, slitted windows. An open section near the top held immense bells. Above that was a flat roof surrounded by a parapet.
“Don’t gape like a fool,” Kit said. “You’re not even inside yet.”
We were stopped at the land side of a bridge, where a guard dressed in blue read a paper that Kit handed him. The guard glared at Kit’s green tunic, then at his face, and Kit glared back. As the horse clattered over the stone bridge, I glanced back over my shoulder. The guard in blue made a gesture at us, one so filthy that in any farming village it would have started a fight to the death.
The Blues and the Greens. Even in the countryside we knew of this, the scandalized talk of every faire and alehouse. I said, “Kit, what—” but my words were drowned out by the pealing of the bells in the tower. They sang a sweet song—but it was loud. When the clamor stopped, we had passed under the iron gate and I forgot my question in astonishment at Glory.
Never had I imagined such a place.
Another ring, but nothing like the villages outside. Stone walls ran crazily through the city, carving it into small spaces crammed with tents. The tents held people, shops, livestock, alehouses—everything I had ever seen in the world, all crammed into spaces too small to hold them, all yelling and reeking. Children shrieked, running among the legs of adults. Chickens cackled. Songbirds in painted cages trilled, adults cried out to each other, a fiddler played, with a wooden box at his feet to receive coins. Everything seemed for sale—food and copper work and live ducks and cloth and chamber pots and leather goods and ale—and at least half of it smelled.
“Red pea soup! Good red pea soup, made fresh this morning!”
“Chickens! Live chickens!”
“Lemme go, Gregory, it’s not your turn!”
“Lavender and herbs!”
“That was my pot, you oaf! Mine!”
“Empty your chamber pot here, will you!”
“Grain for bread!”
“I saw it first!”
“Red pea soup!”
My senses reeled. Kit smiled.
“Flooded your brain, has it, lad? We’ll be inside soon.”
Inside what? “Is it all like this?”
“Everything outside the palace. The law says no trade for three leagues around Glory except within the city itself. There’s not much room left on the island, and the old queen decreed that no stone or wood structures are allowed here. Except the palace, of course.”
That explained all the tents. I saw now that the stone walls, which probably surrounded the palace, were all connected, a single vast structure with sections that shot out in all directions like a huge, rigid, gray plant sprouting stone branches. Some of these branches were short and wide, some long and narrow, some curled gracefully back on themselves like tendrils of stone, some led to other structures, round or boxy or triangular—there was no pattern to it, no plan. And no windows, anywhere. Not one. The palace was another ring, although irregular in the extreme, within the circle of the city. What must it be like inside, at the heart of all these rings?
Kit shouldered his way through the crowded, narrow streets, leading the horse, which barely fit but seemed accustomed to the close, smelly din. People shouted at Kit and he shouted back. Over his shoulder he called to me, “Much of this rabble goes home off the island at night!” I said nothing, stunned by the noise and reek and lack of space to move.
We edged our way toward a wooden gate set into the palace wall. Kit showed his papers to yet another guard, this one dressed in green. The gate was opened, and we stepped inside the palace.
I blinked. Everything was different.
9
WE STOOD IN a large stableyard, open to the sky, very clean and very quiet. The thick wooden gate shut out all noise from the city. The very cobblestones seemed to have been scrubbed of normal dirt. A stable boy rushed forward to take Kit’s horse and lead it into a closed stable at one side of the stable yard. Kit and I walked to the other side of the yard, the crunch of our boots on stone the only sound, and through a second, less fortified gate.
Another courtyard, planted with bushes and boxed in by stone walls with many wooden doors, all painted green. Servants went in and out of the doors. I said timidly, “I have a letter of introduction to one Emma Cartwright, a serving woman to—”
“You go nowhere until you’ve bathed,” Kit said with disgust. “You are a savage, aren’t you? There, to the left—that’s the laborers’ baths. I’ll be here when you’re done.” He strode through doors on the right. Almost I ran after him—what would I do if I were left alone in this strange place? But I did as I was told and went through one of the doors on the left.
More strangeness! The room—perhaps more than one room—had been built out over the river, and the floor removed except for a wide ledge around all four walls. A new floor, wooden on stone pilings, had been built two feet under the water, so that the Thymar flowed right through the room. A few men bathed, naked, in the clean water. I remembered that we had passed a section of the Thymar downriver where it had abruptly turned reeking and foul; the city’s sewage must be sent there. Here, upriver, the water was clean for bathing, and perhaps farther upriver, cleaner yet for drinking. It was an ingenious system.
I removed my clothing and piled it on a shelf against the wall. Other shelves held bars of strong soap. I scrubbed myself clean, pulled back on the tunic Kit had given me, and cleaned my boots in the water. Since I couldn’t bear to put on my smelly small clothes, I wadded them up and left them in a corner, going without underclothes. There was also nothing I could do about my filthy trousers, but the tunic hung to my hips, hiding the worst. Having no comb, I ran my fingers over and again through my wet hair until it held no tangles.
Kit waited in the courtyard, wearing fresh clothes. No riding clothes, these, but a tunic of green velvet, white silk hose, and green shoes. His dark hair gleamed and he had a silver earring in his left ear. I saw that despite his slight stature, he was handsome: a manly little man.
He looked me over and sighed. “I suppose you’ll have to do. Come.”
More courtyards, and my astonishment grew until I thought my eyes, my brain, could take in no more.
Each courtyard was more sumptuous than the last. Wide, quiet, bright with trees and late summer flowers, ringed with buildings of painted gray stone. Then buildings faced with smooth white marble. Finally buildings faced with mosaics of pearl and quartz, all in subtle shades of ivory and cream, all in subtle patterns that changed as the light moved over them. Small fountains appeared, falling in graceful, tinkling arcs. All was subdued, quiet, with a balanced and graceful beauty I had not known existed in the whole wide world. Even the people we passed, dressed in fine green clothing, moved with quiet grace. A few nodded to Kit.
Kit said, “Close your mouth, Roger.” He seemed to grow more and more tense the closer we got to . . . wherever we were going.
Almost I wished I were back with Hartah, with Aunt Jo, jostling along in our wagon. This was too strange
, too different. I could never belong here.
Kit said, “Here I leave you. The quarters for Queen Caroline’s ladies are over there, through that gate. Present your letter of introduction to the guard. I must report the wreck of the Frances Ormund to the Office of Maritime Records and give the news of the hanging of the one surviving wrecker. May all their souls burn forever.”
I could have told him they were not. I could have told him that the wreckers, along with their victims, sat on the beach and the rocks, contemplating the quiet sea. I could have told him his educated belief, that souls burn or else go to paradise, was much farther from the mark than was the countryside belief that they endure in their own land. I told him nothing.
“Worse luck that it had to be me,” Kit said gloomily. “Never a Blue courier about when you need one.”
That was his only reference to the peculiar situation that I—that the entire queendom!—knew existed at court. Kit Beale walked away. With Mistress Conyers’s letter in my sweaty hand, I moved toward the bored guard to meet the unknown Emma Cartwright, she who held my fate in her hands.
She was much older than Mistress Conyers, stout and wrinkled, just as clearly born a servant as the other had been born a lady. Emma Cartwright wore a plain gown of dull green, her hair in neat gray braids wound around her head. But her eyes were piercing. “Did you read this letter, boy?”
“I can’t read, mistress.”
“Ah. And Mistress Conyers thinks you should work in the court laundry.”
“Yes.”
“A boy. As a laundress.”
I said nothing, because what could I say? And was I supposed to kneel? Kit had laughed at me for trying to kneel to him—was this the same? My ignorance shamed me.
We stood in a small, cheerful chamber hung with a tapestry of noblemen on a hunt. Unlit wood was stacked neatly in the fireplace. A pretty carved table held a bottle of wine, several pewter goblets, and a bouquet of flowers. Embroidery, rather badly worked, lay tossed on a three-legged stool. A polished door led to a bedchamber beyond; I could see that in one corner someone had dropped a painted fan behind a brass water bucket.
Mistress Cartwright sighed. “Very well. I’ll ask Joan Campford, who runs the Green laundry. Although why Lettice should mix herself in your affairs—”
I was startled to hear this servant use what must be Mistress Conyers’s given name: Lettice. Then all at once I grasped the situation. Emma Cartwright must have known Mistress Conyers when she was quite small; perhaps she’d even been little Lettice’s nursemaid. That was why Mistress Conyers trusted her. And so—
The door burst open and a girl rushed in. “Emma—you must help me!”
For a long moment I stood frozen, and then I dropped to my knees. No doubt here—this was a lady. She was also the most beautiful girl I had ever seen.
She was small, with long brown hair, its color mingled cinnamon and copper and nutmeg and bronze—more gleaming shades than I could count. The hair flowed loose from beneath a little jeweled cap that framed huge eyes of bright green. The skirts of her gown, green silk with a low bodice and full sleeves, were held up in both hands; she’d been running. Her pointed little chin quivered. She ignored me.
“What is it, my lady?” Emma said.
“The prince! I—oh, here he comes! Tell him I’m ill, dead, anything!” She dashed through the door to the bedchamber and slammed it, seconds before a youth appeared in the outer doorway. Emma sank into a low curtsy.
“Mistress Cartwright, summon Cecilia, please.”
I disliked him immediately. His peremptory tone, his rich clothing, his handsome and sulky face. He looked not that many years older than I but was much more filled out. Well, why not—he ate well every day of his life, the bastard!
Then I realized I was silently cursing a prince, and the blood rushed to my face. How did I dare? I bent my head even lower, but I needn’t have worried. The prince no more noticed me than he would a piece of furniture.
Mistress Cartwright said, “Your Highness, I would summon her except that she is ill and vomiting in her chamber.”
His scowl deepened. “Vomiting? I saw her just moments ago and she was fine!”
“Yes, Your Highness. It came on quite suddenly, and she rushed away lest she disgrace herself in front of you. I’m afraid she ate too eagerly of the roast swan at dinner. Lady Cecilia has a delicate digestion.”
I peered sideways at the prince. He looked uncertain.
Mistress Cartwright said, “If Your Highness would like to wait until I get her cleaned up, her soiled gown changed, and her mouth washed with—”
“Oh, leave it! Let her rest. But tell her I shall expect her at the masque tonight!” He turned and stomped off. Mistress Cartwright closed the door softly behind him. Instantly the inner door opened and Lady Cecilia ran to her serving woman, hugging her. “Thank you, thank you!”
“What happened?” Mistress Cartwright looked grim.
Lady Cecilia laughed, a high sparkly laugh that went on a bit too long. “He tried to kiss me again. And I slapped him and ran away!”
“Did you encourage him before that, my lady? Were you flirting again?”
“Maybe a little.” She smiled, the most enchanting smile I had ever seen. It tilted the corners of her green eyes, showed off her small white teeth. Her skin looked soft as swansdown, and as white. I felt light-headed, which must have caused some slight motion because all at once she noticed me. “And who is this?”
“A new servant. My lady, this is a dangerous game you’re playing with Prince Rupert, I have told you that. You cannot—”
“Oh, Emma, I can manage myself, and the prince, too. It’s all in fun. He knows he must leave on his wedding trip in the spring, and he knows I serve his sister the queen. He would never try more than a kiss, norI a slap.” She giggled, still smiling down at me. “Rise, new servant. Do you have a name? And what will you do here at court?”
“Roger Kilbourne, my lady. I’m to be a laundress.”
“A laundress! How funny!”
Standing, I was much taller than she. All at once I was grateful that the tunic Kit gave me came at least over my hips. My member felt hard as stone. And for a lady born! The light-headedness increased.
“You ears are the most interesting shade of red, Roger,” she said. “Are you blushing? You would look well in a doublet of that shade.”
It was incredible. She was flirting with me, as she must have flirted with the prince. Did she flirt with every man, then? Apparently so. I was not used to being a man anyone flirted with. I was not used to being a man. I was not used to any of this—I, Hartah’s unwilling and underfed slave. Her eyes sparkled like diamonds—no, like emeralds—no, like—
Mistress Cartwright said, “That’s enough, my lady. Go inside and rest, you are supposed to be sick from eating too much roasted swan. Roger, I will take you now to Joan Campford.”
“Good-bye, Roger of the Red Ears,” Lady Cecilia said.
I would never see her again. Or if I caught a glimpse of her, it would be at a distance, riding or dancing or feasting with the queen’s ladies, flirting with the prince. And she would not remember my name.
Wordlessly I followed Emma Cartwright to the palace laundry, where my new life was supposed to begin.
10
HEAT FROM THE constant fires, three of them going day and night, and from the pressing irons. Steam choking the air. Soap so harsh it rose blisters on my hands and arms up to the elbow, to join the skin burns from every careless error with a hot iron. A perpetual ache in my shoulders from hauling cold water from the river. Cold and heat, strong soap and stronger stains, fire and water. This particular laundry—there were others in the palace—dyed and cleaned the clothing and bedding of soldiers, servants, and couriers. Queen Caroline, like her mother, insisted on cleanliness throughout her palace. They were both famous for that.
At the end of the first day, I thought I could not stand the work. By the end of the second day, I knew I could s
tand it but didn’t want to. By the end of the second week, I had accepted my fate. It was not all bad here. Joan Campford, although she ran her laundry like a captain of the guard, was not unkind. I had three good meals every day in the servants’ kitchen, nourishing food such as I had seldom enjoyed before. The other laundresses, all older women, made endless jokes about the boy doing women’s work, but no one beat me. So I became resigned. That’s what hard and ceaseless work is designed to do: require all your energy so that none is left over to think of another life.
Except that I did think of other lives. As I hauled water and boiled sweat-soaked tunics and pressed clothing, I thought ceaselessly of Hartah, of Aunt Jo, of the Frances Ormund, of what I had done on the rocky little beach, of Lady Cecilia, of my mother among the Dead “at Hygryll on Soulvine Moor.” Worse, I dreamed of them all. And in my dreams, as I had done in the hayloft of the inn, I called out.
“Wake up! Wake up, curse you!”
The boy who slept on the next pallet in the apprentice chamber shook me roughly awake.
“That’s the second time tonight! Who can sleep with you caterwauling like that!”
“Not me,” said another voice, equally annoyed. “I am sick of hearing about Frances Ormund! Who is she, your sweet-heart? Go lie with her and not with me!”
Frances Ormund. Fright took me. What had I said, and what might I blurt next in my sleep, perhaps alongside someone who understood what he heard? Blindly I groped my way from the apprentice chamber to find somewhere else to sleep. The best I could do was the servants’ kitchen, under one of the long trestle tables where we took our meals.
A few hours’ fitful sleep, and another hand shook my shoulder. “What are you doing here? You can’t sleep here!”
Groggy still, I half opened my eyes. A girl crouched under the table beside me. From some dream, or some madness, I thought she was Cat Starling. Before I knew what I was about, I had pulled her to me and kissed her.