“Oh, Talia—” Jeri piled her hair on the top of her head and simpered at her in imitation of Skif. “Would you like a—mushroom? Take two! Take a hundred!”
“Oh, thank you, no, dear, dear Skif—” Sherrill batted her eyelashes coyly at “Skif.” “I’d much rather have a—pickle.”
“I’ll just bet you would, wouldn’t you?” “Skif” replied, with a leer.
About this time the real Talia was torn between hilarity and outraged embarrassment. “I don’t know where you get your filthy minds,” she said, attacking both of them with a bar of soap and a sponge, “but they plainly need a good scrubbing!”
The episode degenerated at that point into a ducking and splashing match that soaked every towel in the room and brought down the wrath of the Housekeeper on all three of them.
* * *
“Hist!” someone hissed at Talia from behind the bushes next to the entrance to the gardens. She jumped, remembering all too well the misery of the months previous—then relaxed as she realized the whisperer was Skif.
“What on earth are you doing in there?” she asked, getting down on hands and knees, and seeing him in a kind of tunnel between two planted rows of hedges.
“What I told you I’d do—spying on the Brat. There’s something I want to show you. Squeeze on in here and follow me!”
She looked at him a bit doubtfully, then saw that he was completely serious, and did as he asked. They crawled through the prickly tunnel for some time before Skif stopped and Talia all but bumped into him. He signed at her to be quiet, and parted the twigs on one side, just enough for both of them to peer through.
Elspeth and her two nurses, Hulda and Melidy, were no more than a few feet away. They had no problem listening in on their conversation.
“Oh, no, dear,” Hulda was saying gently. “It’s quite out of the question. Your rank is much too high for you to be associating with Lord Delphor’s children. You are the Heir to the Throne, after all.”
Talia bit her lip angrily as Elspeth’s face fell. Old Melidy seemed to wake up a little from her half-doze. Her wrinkled face was creased with a faint frown as she seemed to be struggling to remember something.
“Hulda, that…” she began slowly,”… that just doesn’t seem right somehow…”
“What doesn’t seem right, dear?” Hulda asked with artificial sweetness.
“Elspeth isn’t… She can’t…”
“Be expected to know these things, I know. Now don’t you worry about a thing. Just drink your medicine like a dear love, and I’ll take care of everything.” Hulda poured a tiny glass of something red and sticky-looking and all but forced it into Melidy’s hand. The old woman gave up the struggle for thought and obediently drank it down. Not long afterward she fell asleep again.
Skif motioned that they should leave, and they hacked out of the hedgerow on all fours.
“That’s what I wanted you to see,” he said, as they exited the hedge in a distant part of the garden. “Hold still, you’ve got twigs in your hair.” He began picking them out carefully.
“So’ve you. And leaves. She must be drugging Melidy, and keeping her drugged. Witch! But how did the old woman get into a state where she allowed herself to be drugged in the first place?”
“You’ve got me; I can’t hazard a guess. Ask Jadus, maybe he knows. Want me to keep watching?”
“If you don’t mind. I want to know if she’s doing this on her own or at someone else’s direction. And I want to know what else she’s telling the child.”
“Oh, I don’t mind; this is fun! It’s like being back on the streets again, except that now I’m not in danger of losing a hand or being hungry all the time,” he grinned.
“Oh, Skif—” She stopped, unsure of what to say next. Then, greatly daring, she leaned forward on an impulse and kissed his cheek lightly, blushed, and scampered away.
Skif stared after her in surprise, one hand raised to touch the spot she’d kissed.
* * *
Jadus didn’t know anything about the state of Melidy’s health, but he directed her to one of the Healers who would.
“Melidy was ill about two years ago,” she said thoughtfully. “Do you know what a ‘brainstorm’ is?”
“Isn’t that where an old person suddenly can’t move or talk—maybe even falls unconscious for a long time—and then gets better, slowly?”
The Healer nodded. “That’s what happened to Melidy. She seemed, to have recovered completely, at least to me. I might have been wrong, though. Lady knows we aren’t infallible.”
“Maybe you weren’t wrong—or maybe she was affected in some way that you wouldn’t have noticed,” Talia replied, sounding much more adult than she appeared, and making the Healer’s eyes widen in surprise. “Keldar’s mother had a brainstorm after she brought her to live at our Hold. She seemed completely all right—except that you had to be very careful what you said to her because she’d believe anything you told her, no matter how absurd it was. That might have been what happened to Melidy.”
And if it was, she thought grimly, she’d have been easy prey for Hulda.
“As for that medicine you saw Hulda giving her, I never prescribed anything like that for her, but it might be a folk remedy, or one of the other Healers might have ordered it for her. I can check if you’d like…”
Talia belatedly realized that this might not be a wise idea. She didn’t want Hulda alerted if the woman was up to something—and she didn’t want her embarrassed if she wasn’t.
“No, that’s all right, thank you. It probably is just a folk remedy. In fact, now that I think of it, it looked a lot like a syrup Keldar used to give her mother for aching joints.”
The Healer smiled, with obvious relief. “Melidy does have arthritis, and unfortunately there isn’t much we can do for her other than try and ease the pain. The potion might very well be one of ours. I’m glad the other nurse seems to be taking care of her, then. Is there anything else I can do for you?”
“No—thank you,” Talia replied. “You’ve answered everything I needed to ask.”
But, she thought as she walked slowly back to her room, you raised a lot more questions than you answered.
9
“If only I could go back in time…”
“If only you could what?” Skif asked, looking up from the book he’d been studying. Talia was perched in his open window, staring out at the moonlit trees, her own mind plainly not on study.
“I said, ‘if only I could go back in time,’” she repeated. “I’d give half an arm to know if there was anyone besides Elspeth’s father involved in bringing Hulda here—especially since she arrived after he was dead. But the only way I could find that out is to go back in time.”
“Not—quite—”
Skif’s expression was speculative, and Talia waited for him to finish the thought.
“There’s the immigration records—everything about anyone who comes in from outKingdom is in them. If Hulda had any other sponsors, they’d be in there. And it seems to me there’s something in the laws about immigrants having to have three sponsors to live here permanently. One would have been the Prince, and one Selenay—but the third might prove very interesting…”
“Where are these records kept? Can anybody get at them?” Talia’s voice was full of eagerness.
“They’re kept right here at the palace, in the Provost-Marshal’s office. Keeping those records is one of his duties. But as for getting at them—” Skif made a face “—we can’t, not openly. Well, you could, but you’d have to invoke authority as Queen’s Own, and Hulda would be sure to hear of it.”
“Not a good idea,” Talia agreed. “So we can’t get at them openly—but?”
“But I could get at them. It’s no big deal, just—”
“Just that The Book is there, too,” Talia finished for him. “Well, you haven’t had any misdemeanors down in The Book for nearly a year, have you?”
“Hell, no! You’ve been keeping me too busy!�
�� he grinned, then the grin faded. “Still, if I got caught, they’d figure I was in there to alter The Book. Orthallen doesn’t like me at all; I’m like a burr under his saddle. I don’t grant him proper respect, I don’t act like a sober Heraldic Trainee. He’d love the chance to really slap me down.” He looked at Talia’s troubled face, then his grin revived. “Oh, hell, what can he do to me, anyway? Confine me to the Collegium grounds? I haven’t been off ’em since I met you, almost! I’ll do it, by the gods!”
* * *
There was something wrong—there was something very wrong. Skif wasn’t late—not yet—but Talia suddenly had the feeling that he was in a lot of trouble, and more than he could handle. And tonight was the night he was supposed to be getting into those immigration records…
Although she had no clear idea of what she was going to do, Talia found herself running through the halls of the Collegium—then the halls of the Palace itself. It was only when she neared Selenay’s quarters that she paused her headlong flight, waited until she had her breath back, and then approached the door of the Queen’s private chambers shyly. The guard there knew her well; he winked at her, and entered the door to announce her. She could hear the vague murmur of voices, then he opened the door again and waved her inside.
She drew in a trembling breath and prayed that something would guide her, and went in. The door closed quietly behind her.
Selenay was sitting at the worktable, flushed and disturbed-looking. Elcarth, Keren, and the Seneschal’s Herald, Kyril, were standing like a screen between Talia and something behind them. Standing between Selenay and the Heralds was Lord Orthallen. Talia’s heart sank. It was Skif, then. She had to save him. He’d been caught, and it must have been much worse than he thought. But how was she going to be able to get him off?
“Majesty—” she heard herself saying, “—I—I’ve got something to confess.”
Selenay looked confused, and Talia continued, “I—I asked Skif to do something for me. It wasn’t—quite—legal.”
As Selenay waited, Talia continued in a rush, “I wanted him to get the Holderkin records for me.”
“The Holderkin records?” Selenay repeated, puzzled. “But why?”
Talia had no notion where these ideas were coming from, but apparently they were good ones. She hated the notion of lying, but she daren’t tell the truth, either. “I—I wanted to make sure I wasn’t in them anymore.” To her own surprise, she felt hot, angry tears starting to make her eyes smart. “They didn’t want me—well, I don’t want them, not any of them, not ever! Skif told me Sensholding could claim Privilege Tax when I earn my Whites, and I don’t want them to have it!”
Now she was really crying with anger, flushed, and believing every word she’d told them herself. Selenay was smiling a smile bright with relief; Elcarth looked bemused, Keren vindicated, Kyril slightly amused, and Orthallen—Talia was startled by his expression. Orthallen looked for one brief instant like a man who has been cheated out of something he thought surely in his grasp. Then he resumed his normal expression—a cool, impassive mask, and try as she might, Talia couldn’t get past it.
“You see, Orthallen, I told you there’d be a simple explanation,” Elcarth was saying then, as the Heralds moved apart, and Talia could see who it was that they had been screening from her view. She wasn’t surprised to see Skif, white and tense, sitting in a chair as if he’d been glued there.
“Then why wouldn’t the boy tell us himself?” Orthallen asked coldly.
“Because I didn’t want Talia in trouble, too!” Skif said in a surly tone of voice. “I told you I wasn’t after The Book, so what business was it of yours what I did want? You aren’t the Provost-Marshal!”
“Skif,” Kyril said mildly, “he may not be the Provost-Marshal, but Lord Orthallen is entitled to a certain amount of respect from you.”
“Yes, sir,” Skif mumbled and looked steadfastly at his feet.
“Well, now that this matter seems to have cleared itself up, shall we let the miscreants go?” Selenay smiled slightly. “Talia, the next time you want something in the records, just ask Kyril or myself. And we’ll make sure you aren’t listed in the Census as Holderkin anymore, if that’s what you want. But—well, I still don’t quite understand why you didn’t come to me in the first place.”
Talia knew from the tightness of the skin of her face that she had gone from red to white. “I—it was selfish. UnHeraldlike. I didn’t want anybody else to know…”
Elcarth had crossed the space between them and placed an arm around her shoulders. “You’re only human, little one—and your kin don’t deserve any kindness from you after the way they’ve disowned you. Skif—” he held out his hand to the boy, who stood slowly, and came to stand beside Talia, taking one of her hands and staring at Orthallen defiantly “—you and Talia go back to your rooms, why don’t you? You’ve had a long night. Don’t do this again, younglings, but—well, we understand. Now get along.”
Skif all but dragged Talia from the room.
“Good gods—how the hell did you think of that? You were great! I started to believe you! And how did you know I was up to my ears in trouble?”
“I don’t know—it just sort of came,” Talia replied, “and I just knew you were in for it. What happened? How did you get caught?”
“Sheer bad luck,” Skif said ruefully, slowing their headlong rush down the hall. “Selenay needed some of the Census reports and Orthallen came after them. He saw my light in the Provost-Marshal’s office, and caught me red-handed. Gods, gods, was I stupid! It wouldn’t have happened if I’d been paying any attention at all to the sounds from the corridor.”
“What was he going to do to you?”
“He was trying to get me suspended. He couldn’t get me expelled unless Cymry repudiated me, but—well, he was trying to get me sent off to clean stables for the Army for the next four years—‘until I learned what honest work means,’ he said.”
“Could—could he have done that?”
“Unfortunately, he could. I’ve got one too many marks in The Book. There’s an obscure Collegium rule covering that, and he found out about it, somehow. If I didn’t know better, I’d say he’s been looking for a way to get me.”
“You’d better stop helping me, then…”
By now they were outside Talia’s door.
“Be damned if I will! This is so frustrating—I’d just found Hulda’s records, too! Well, we’ll just have to give up on those, and stick with what we’ve been doing. But there’s no way I’m going to let this stop me!”
He stopped, and gave her a quick hug, then pushed her toward her door. “Go on, get some sleep. You look like you could use it, and I feel like somebody’s been using me for pells!”
* * *
Talia was studying alone in her room one night, when there was a light tapping on her door. She opened it—to find a black, demonic looking creature on the other side.
A hand clamped over her mouth before she could shriek, and the thing dragged her back inside, kicking the door closed behind it.
“Ssh! Don’t yell—it’s me, Skif!” the thing admonished her in a hoarse whisper.
He took his hand away from her mouth gingerly, ready to clamp it down again if she screamed.
She didn’t; just stared at him with huge, round eyes. “Skif—what are you trying to do to me?” she said finally. “I nearly died of fright! Why are you rigged out like that?”
“Why do you think? You don’t go climbing around in the restricted parts of the Palace dressed in Grays—and I’m a bit too young to look convincing in Whites. Get your breath back and calm yourself down because tonight you’re coming with me.”
“Me? But—”
“Don’t argue, just get into these.” He handed her a tight-fitting shirt and breeches of dusty black. “Good thing you’re my size, or nearly. And don’t ask me where I got them, or why, ’cause I can’t tell you.” He waited patiently while she laced herself into the garments, then handed he
r a box of greasy black soot. “Rub this anywhere there’s skin showing, and don’t miss anything—not even the back of your neck.”
He went to her window, opened it to its widest extent, and looked down. “Good. We won’t even have to go down to the ground from here.” He produced a rope and tied it around Talia’s waist. “Now follow me—and do exactly what I do.”
The scramble that followed was something Talia preferred not to remember in later years. Skif had them climbing from window to window across the entire length of the Collegium wing, and from there along the face of the Palace itself. Talia was profoundly grateful for the narrow ledge that ran most of the way, for she doubted she could have managed without it. At length he brought them to a halt just outside a darkened window. Talia clung with all her might to the wall, trying not to think of the drop behind her, as he peered cautiously in through the cracks in the shutter.
He seemed satisfied with what he found, for he took something out of a pouch at his belt and began working away at the chink between the two halves of the shutter. Before too long, they swung open. Skif climbed inside, and Talia followed him.
The room disclosed was bare of furniture and seemingly unused. Skif led her to the closet set into one wall, opened it, and felt along the back wall. Talia heard the scrape of wood on wood, and a pair of peepholes was revealed.
Light shone through them from the other side. Talia quickly put her eye to one, and as she did so, Skif handed her a common drinking glass. He pantomimed placing it to the wall and putting her ear against it. She did, and realized she could hear every word spoken in the other room, faintly, but clearly.
“—so at this rate, the child is unlikely ever to be Chosen, much less made Heir. You’re doing quite well, quite well indeed,” an unctuous baritone said with satisfaction. “Needless to say, we’re quite well pleased with you.”
“My lord is most gracious.” Talia could see the second speaker, Hulda, but was unable to see the first, and his voice was too distorted by the glass for her to recognize it. “Shall I continue as I have gone?”
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