The Born Queen tkotab-4

by Greg Keyes

  A throat cleared softly behind her.

  "I'm ready, thank you," she said.

  The sun was a hand above the horizon when she met Berimund in the courtyard. The young man's face was flushed, and his eyes a bit glassy.

  "I hardly believe you can walk," Muriele said. "I'm impressed."

  "Practice," Berimund said. "Long practice from childhood."

  "Well, I thank you for remembering your promise."

  "About that," he said. "There's still time to change your mind."

  "Why would I? I'm looking forward to meeting your father."

  He nodded, looking as if he wanted to say something but not saying it.

  "You make that riding habit look very nice," he said finally.

  "Thank you," she replied. "It's an interesting dress."

  The overskirt was cut rather like a knee-length hauberk, split up the front and back and made of wool felted into myriad patterns of serpents, falcons, and horsemen in muted golds, reds, and browns. It was sleeveless, so she wore a darker brown shirt beneath and numerous underskirts to protect modesty. Her calf-high buskins fastened at the top with a wolf's head and were laced over woolen stockings. It seemed silly and barbaric, and she had thought at first that the dress was an attempt to humiliate her.

  But Berimund was attired in equally outlandish pants and a robelike coat.

  "Interesting," he repeated, grinning. "I sense an understatement."

  "I'm not familiar with the fashion, that's all."

  "It's a recent one. My father has an interest in the ancient times, and his scholars have determined that our mountain tribes are more like our revered ancestors than we folk of the cities. We have therefore adopted some aspects of their dress."

  "I see. I had no idea the mountain tribesmen wore Safnian silk shirts."

  "Well, there have been a few adaptations, I'll allow."

  "When I first came to Eslen, the men were favoring floppy woolen caps like the ones the Cresson brothers wore at the battle of Ravenmark Wold. It seems silly now."

  "I wouldn't make that comparison," Berimund said stiffly. "Or call our fashions silly. Is it a bad thing to remember the virtues of our forefathers?"

  "Not at all," Muriele said. "I wish you and your father were more reminded of them, as a matter of fact, since your forefathers helped in originating the ancient covenant of embassy."

  Berimund actually seemed to wince slightly, but he didn't reply.

  "Shall we go to the hunt?" he asked instead.

  The horses were clad in similarly strange harness, and her mount was provided with a quiver of arrows and a spear with a broad leaf-shaped head.

  So caparisoned, she and Berimund and six of his retainers rode out of Hauhhaim through Gildgards, a tidy neighborhood with so many gardens that it seemed almost like countryside. She asked Berimund about it.

  "The merchant guilds are given land within the walls for farming," he explained. "In good times, they sell their surplus and profit from it. When Kaithbaurg comes under siege, their produce reverts to the king. Anyway, it makes the city more pleasant, don't you think?"

  Muriele agreed, and not much later they passed through the Gildgards gate and into a countryside of vast barley fields and small villages. After perhaps a bell, their path took them into the lowlands around the river and finally into Thiuzanswalthu, Marcomir's hunting preserve, a vast, parklike evergreen wood. Soon they came upon a bustling camp sprawled out around a large tent. A group of horsemen and horsewomen were mustering like a small army, and they were all dressed much as Berimund and she were.

  Berimund dismounted, took the reins of her horse, and led her over to the group.

  Marcomir was a bit of a shock. She had met him once when she was fourteen and he had come to the Lierish court. At that time he had been in his fifties, but she still had been struck by the physical power that seemed to animate him, and she'd been a bit infatuated, taking every excuse to hover around while he was visiting.

  Even now, she had a clear image of him in her mind.

  That image was no longer accurate, however. Time had so shrunken and bent the monarch that she didn't recognize him until she was introduced. The color had been bleached from him. If she didn't know better, she would think him an albino. He trembled constantly.

  But when she met his gaze, she glimpsed that old strength. It had been drained from his body and fermented, distilled, bittered there behind his eyes. As those pale orbs fastened on her, she felt as small as a barleycorn, and less significant.

  "Father," Berimund said. "I introduce to you Muriele Dare, queen of Crotheny, queen mother to Empress Anne I."

  Marcomir continued to stare at her.

  "I've invited her to hunt with us."

  "What do you want here, witch?" the old man asked. His speaking broke the spell; his watery, quavering voice could not match his gaze. "Have you come here to murder me? Is that your intention?"

  Muriele sat straighter but did not see any reason to answer such a question.

  "Father!" Berimund said. "Do not be so ill-mannered. This lady-"

  "Hush, whelp," the king snarled. "I told you I would not see her. Why have you brought her here?"

  "You said I could not present her in court," Berimund replied. "You said nothing about hunting."

  "That's a hair in my beard," Marcomir snapped. "You understood my intent."

  He swung back to Muriele. "But since you are here, let me spell clearly for you. Your shinecrafting daughter is not and will never be queen. She has unleashed horrors that no man should ever see and tilted the world toward doom. I will not be guiled with words; I will not be won with gifts or favors. This is the battle foretold, the great war against evil, the ansuswurth itself, and we-with the holy Church-will stand against your dark lady and your unhulthadiusen, and we will send you all back to the abyss."

  As she watched the spittle drip down his chin, Muriele found that she had had enough.

  "If I had known," she began, "that Your Majesty was a despicable liar who clothes himself in holy raiment to disguise the greedy, covetous ambition he has nursed for decades, I certainly would never have come here in hopes of a conversation. You are a loathsome thing, Marcomir. A better man would simply admit his avarice for power and control, but like a little child you make up stories to disguise your disgusting nature and in doing so become even more abhorrent. You dress your lords and ladies in homage to your beloved ancestors, but there is more honor in a single one of their rotting bones than in your entire body. Sing your churchish songs and play the harp of saintliness, but I know what you are, and so do you, and nothing you say or do, no host you muster, no war you win, will change that. I traveled to Hansa in hope of finding a man. Instead I find this. How sad and repulsive."

  Marcomir had found color for his face somewhere. He trembled more violently than ever.

  "My dear sister-in-law," a voice said behind her. "You still have that turn of phrase that so wins the hearts of men."

  Only Muriele's anger kept her from screaming as she turned and saw Robert Dare sitting casually on a spotted mare, grinning from ear to ear.

  Neil glanced up at the vast ceiling of the chapel and shook his head.

  "What's that for, Sir Neil?" Alis asked.

  "Why is it so big?"

  "You don't find it beautiful?"

  Neil traced his gaze up a narrow buttress that must have been twenty kingsyards high. Light colored its lean length, suffused through a dome pierced by a myriad of crystal portals that also illuminated statues of the winged saints, the lords of sky, wind, thunder, the sun, moon, stars, and planets. Many looked as if they actually were flying.

  "It is. But it's also distracting. How can one pray properly among so much…so much?"

  "The chapel in Eslen is easily as large and ornate."

  "I know. I didn't understand that, either."

  "It's not so in the islands?"

  "No. The chapels are very plain and no bigger than necessary to kneel or be lustrated. I fe
el lost in a place this big."

  "Well, I, for one, feel the need to pray. Will you wait for me?"

  "Should we separate?"

  "I don't see why not," she said. "If our escort wanted to do us harm, I don't imagine that would be a problem."

  "I'll try to find Lier's fane in all of this, then," Neil said. "I'll meet you back here in the center."

  Alis nodded and walked off, the whisk-whisk of her skirts echoing in the cavernous place.

  Neil strolled past the saints of law and war, wondering if he ought to stop there, but the real need he felt was to find Lier, and so he continued to search, wondering what the saints thought of such ostentation. He supposed it depended on the saint. Some of them might be flattered.

  It took a bit of time for him to realize the consistency of the groupings. The saints of sky were above, those of the qualities and affairs of men at eye level. That meant logically that he ought to look for a staircase down.

  Once he knew what to search for, it wasn't hard to find. Soon he was in a darker, quieter part of what was rightly a temple rather than a chapel.

  There he found the saints beneath the earth and there, at last, the alter of Lier. The saint was carved from marble and shown as a man rising up from a wave, his long hair and beard blending with the foam.

  The chapel on Skern had a rough image whittled from an old piece of mast found as driftwood.

  Neil knelt, placed two silver coins in the box, and began to sing his prayer:

  Foam Father, Wave Strider

  You feel our keels and hear our prayers

  Grant us passage on your broad back,

  Bring us to shore when the storm's upon us, I beg you now Grant passage to my song.

  It echoed weirdly through the halls, coming back to him to form odd harmonies. He tried to focus beyond that, to fill his mind with the presence of the saint, with the wild salt spray, with the great eternal thing that was the ocean. And at last he did, as the rhythm of his prayer ebbed and flowed, and he felt the deeps beneath him once again. He prayed for Alis and Muriele, for Queen Anne and his friends, for the dead and the living.

  When he was done, he felt better, and humbled. Who was he to disparage what sort of chapel someone chose to build?

  Before Muriele could find any words to meet Robert with, Marcomir's voice began rattling in such rapid Hansan that she couldn't have understood him if she was trying to, which she wasn't. She was vaguely aware that Berimund also was shouting. Robert's grin became somehow more wicked.

  Marcomir's tone dropped, and he finally switched back to the king's tongue.

  "You do not speak to me like that," he said very coldly. "It is a mistake you will regret."

  Muriele kept her gaze on Robert as she replied.

  "Here is the proof of your hypocrisy," she said. "You claim my daughter to be a witch, and yet you harbor this-this thing at your court. He is a fratricide and an abomination of nature. Cut him; see if he bleeds. Feel his heart; see if it beats. You will find it does not. But then, you already know that, don't you?"

  "Oh, dear," Robert began. "I know we've had a bit of a tiff, Muriele, but really-"

  "Swiya! Silence!" Marcomir snapped at Robert before turning his full fury on Muriele.

  "I ought to kill you like a rabid bitch, right here and now," the king said very quietly. "You twist words, but I know the truth. You speak for her." He came closer. "There will be no truce with evil, no compromise, and no peace. We will destroy your daughter and the heretics who follow her, or we will perish trying. In either case, no peace will ever be made, so I need never explain what happened to you."

  "You would not," Muriele said.

  "He wouldn't," Berimund replied.

  "What do you know, whelp? What makes you so compliant? Have you lain with this mother of witches?"

  "I have not," Berimund replied.

  "Haven't you?"

  "I just said that I have not," Berimund gritted out.

  The old king straightened a bit. "Very well," he said. "Then you take her to Wothensaiw and strike off her head for me."

  Berimund went pale. "Father, no."

  "You are my son and my subject," Marcomir said. "As neither can you refuse me."

  She actually heard him swallow. "Father, you're angry now. Take some time-"

  "Berimund, before the Ansus and all my men, do this or you are not my son."

  "It's not right, and you know it."

  "I am king. What I say is right."

  Muriele felt the tightness in her chest and realized her breath had been caught there for a while. As she let it out, she seemed to be drifting away with it, watching it all from above.

  Berimund's head bent and then nodded.

  When he looked up, his eyes were brimming. "I'm sorry," he said.

  "Berimund-"

  "Hush, Majesty."

  As they led her off, she saw Robert moving his lips, perhaps taunting her, perhaps trying to tell her something. Either way, the glee on his face was obvious.

  Neil and Alis were escorted back to Berimund's "rooms," where they were free to wander in what amounted to a small mansion. He walked about restlessly, learning the floor plan, finding the ways in and out.

  Worrying about Muriele.

  Alis had managed to charm one of the retainers into giving her an extended tour of the castle. He would rather remain here, where he could greet the queen when she returned.

  Of course, it might be days. He wished he could have gone.

  He found a window facing east and watched the Donau flow toward the sea.

  Night came, and he reluctantly took to his bed.

  As the door burst open, Neil was already on his feet and reaching for Battlehound. He shook back the Queryen webs from his eyes, trying to remember where he was and who might be coming at him with blinding lanterns.

  "Lay your arms down," a voice commanded. "In the name of Marcomir, king of Hansa, give up that sword."

  Neil hesitated. There were a lot of them. He had slept in his gambeson, which would afford a little protection, but he couldn't see how they were armored.

  "I am Queen Muriele's man," he said. "I am here on embassy and claim the rights that come with that."

  "You've no such rights, not anymore," the man behind the lanterns said. "Give up that weapon and come with us."

  "I will see my queen first."

  "She isn't here," the man replied.

  Neil charged.

  Something heavy came from behind the light and smacked him on the side of the head. He stumbled, and hands gripped his sword arm. He swung his left fist and connected with someone and was rewarded by a grunt. Then they were all over him, punching, pummeling, kicking. His hands were lashed behind his back, a blindfold was tied on his face, and they dragged him from the room and through the castle for what seemed like an infinity. Then they were out of doors for a while, then back inside, in a place where the air felt very heavy. He was finally pushed roughly to the ground and heard the slamming of a metal gate. The floor smelled like urine.

  He lay there for a bit and then started working at the bonds. It didn't take much. They had gone on quickly and sloppily, and he'd kept tense as possible while they had tied them. Once they were off, he removed the blindfold.

  It didn't help much. It was still utterly dark.

  By feel he discovered that he was in a stone cell barely large enough to lie down in and not quite tall enough to stand in.

  His heart picked up a bit. He'd grown up on the moors and mountains and open sea. Even spacious rooms with no windows made him feel trapped.

  This-this would drive him mad right quickly.

  He lay back down so that he couldn't feel any of the walls and tried to imagine he was on the deck of a ship, with the clouds rolling overhead.

  He wasn't sure how long it was before he heard footsteps. He both fastened on them and tried not to hope. What hope was there? That Alis had followed, killed whatever guards there were, and was ready to spirit him to safety?
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  Then he heard a feminine voice, and the ridiculous hope suddenly found roots.

  It wasn't Alis, of course, but a large gray-haired woman dressed in a peculiar black robe. Four other women in similar habit and a large man who stank as much as the floor accompanied her.

  "I am Walzamerka Gautisdautar, the king's inquisitor," she said. "You will not struggle. You will answer my questions. If you want any answers at all, if you want to live until tomorrow, you will hang on my every word, as if I were the mother who gave you life, for I am surely the one who can take it away."

  "I'm at your mercy," Neil said. "Only tell me how my queen is."

  "Your queen has been kidnapped," the woman said. "We are searching for her now."

  "Kidnapped?"

  "Yes, by Prince Berimund, if you can believe it."

  "They were going hunting-"

  "Indeed. Instead he abducted her. Do you have any idea why?"

  "None. It makes no sense to me."

  "To me, either." She paused. "You should know we've captured your little coven-trained spy, as well."

  Neil didn't say anything to that.

  "Very well," Walzamerka said. "Come along and mind your manners."

  The inquisitor led him down past a line of cells like his, up some stairs, and into a long, narrow hallway. Then they went up two minor staircases and finally ascended a long winding one, so he reckoned he was in one of the towers.

  They emerged at last into a room lit with gentle candlelight. He blinked, and for a moment he felt a strange movement of time, as if he had gone back months and was waking on a certain ship. The chamber was warm, wood-paneled, and close, the light dim and golden.

  A woman stood there, clothed in a black gown. She wore an ivory mask that did not cover her mouth. Her hands were alabaster; her white hair was fine and came only as low as her throat.

  And he knew her.

  "Sir Neil," the woman said in her familiar, throaty voice.

  "Take a knee, Sir Neil," the inquisitor said. "Take a knee before Her Highness, the Princess Brinna Marcomirsdautar Fram Reiksbaurg."

  CHAPTER TWO

  THE ANGEL

  ROMMER ENSGRIFT backed away from Mery, who watched him go without much expression.