That surprised me. “You don’t want me to catch the killer?”
“Of course I do.” He shook his head. “If there is a killer. But the possibility must be acknowledged that, if Chora was murdered, the killer has already fled the city. Let the dead bury the dead, as they say. It’s far more important to find the one who holds the gift of kings and place them on the throne. We’re at war, whether the populace in general is aware of it or not.” The Archbishop tapped his lips with one finger. “But I’m afraid I’m going to require a bit more from you, Lord Dura.”
Without moving, I braced myself. “And what would that be?”
He nodded his head. “No matter what you find, the queen’s death must officially remain an accident.”
On my left, Bolt grunted. “Not much has changed in Cynestol.”
Instead of taking offense, the Archbishop merely nodded. “Nor will it, while I remain in power.”
“You’re asking me to lie,” I said.
“Far from it,” the Archbishop replied. “I’m asking you not to speak. Cynestol is a city of over three hundred thousand souls, most of whom are simple people who rely on the church and the crown to preserve order. If word should spread that Queen Chora was murdered, many more people will die in the panic.”
“You already know she was murdered,” I said. “She was a dancer. What are the chances someone who expressed their physical gift that way would fall down a set of stairs?”
He nodded. “That’s better. I’m not proficient in the mathematicum, but I would say the chances are almost none. To the point, however, do I have your word, Lord Dura?”
I didn’t like it, but I didn’t have much choice. “Yes. I need to see her body.”
“Out of the question. To give you or anyone else not a part of the royal household access to Queen Chora’s body is as much as admitting she was murdered.”
“Then how am I supposed to find her killer, Archbishop?”
He smiled. “I’m going to give you access to court, Lord Dura.” He waved at all of us assembled around him. “You and all your friends. If there is a killer stupid enough to remain in the city, then he or she is probably there.”
The Archbishop rose and walked with shuffling steps back to his desk, where he took parchment and ink and wrote two notes. “The first letter is to Queen Chora’s chamberlain, instructing him to provide rooms and servants in the palace for your stay. You cannot view the body, but this will allow you to inspect the scene of her death. The second one is to the queen’s seneschal. He’ll introduce you at court.” He nodded to Gael and Rory. “All of you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, the queen’s death has placed the temporal burdens of running the city onto the shoulders of the church, and there are thousands of details to tend to.”
After we’d departed the Archbishop’s chambers and were out of earshot of his secretary, Bolt held out his hand. “Let me see the notes.”
He read through both of them, his face twisting in disgust. “I thought as much. I’ve always suspected Vyne of a mean streak.”
“What did he do?” Gael asked.
“He’s introduced me to the chamberlain and the seneschal as Tueri Consto. I never did like that name.”
Chapter 14
Bishop Serius met us at the door to Cardinal Jactans’s office to escort us out of the cathedral. He didn’t speak, but every few steps I could see him looking at Bolt out of the corner of his eyes.
“You don’t remember me, do you, Errant Consto?” he finally said as we came to the entrance leading out to the stables.
“Aer have mercy,” Bolt growled. “It’s bad enough that you and the Archbishop have saddled me with my name again, but now you’re going to put my title in front of it as well? Did it never occur to any of you that I might have a job to do here?”
Flustered, Serius elected to ignore the question. “I was there the day the assassins came for Queen Chora.”
“Everyone was there,” Bolt said. “King Sylvest had just married her, and she was being coronated.”
“No.” He shook his head. “I mean, yes, but I was the Archbishop’s page,” Serius continued. “I saw you and the other Errants protect the queen.” He shook his head, his amazement still fresh after forty years. “We knew you were all gifted, but I’ve never seen such a display.” He turned to face the rest of us. “A hundred arrows . . .”
“Probably no more than a score and a half,” Bolt muttered.
“. . . came for the queen,” Serius said as though Bolt hadn’t spoken. “But the Errants pulled swords and shields and created a shell of protection over her. That’s when the assassins, thirty of them . . .”
“More like ten,” Bolt corrected.
“. . . themselves gifted, came leaping out of the crowd. The Errants—only four in number—set a hedge around Queen Chora to meet the attack, their blades appearing and disappearing as if by magic.”
“That part’s true enough”—Bolt shrugged—“but so did the blades of the attackers.”
“The blows came too quick to follow,” Serius said, his arms and eyes wide, “and blood flew everywhere, but at the last only three attackers and Errant Consto remained.”
“Nonsense,” Bolt said. “It was two. Those men had gifts that were very nearly as pure as ours. Three against one would have reduced me to chopped mutton.”
“Placing himself between the attackers and the queen,” Serius said, “the last Errant challenged them, his voice raining disdain.”
“Aer have mercy,” Bolt said rounding on our escort. “Serius, if you were there, you know I did no such thing. I was trying to save a frightened girl without getting cut to ribbons myself. I put myself in front of the queen because it forced the assassins to come at me one at a time.” He put his hand against his left side. “Even so it was a close thing. I didn’t have time or breath to make any silly challenges. I just wanted to make sure we both lived.”
Disappointment clouded the bishop’s face. “It sounds better the way I tell it.”
“Except for the fact that it’s not true,” Bolt said.
“It’s mostly true.”
We claimed our horses from a shy-looking priest who didn’t meet our gaze, and I wondered after Myle. Who would visit him now that Gael had left Bunard?
“The palace is on the other side of the city,” Bolt said. “The people of Aille like to maintain the fiction that the church and the state are separate entities.”
“Aren’t they?” Gael asked.
Bolt shook his head. “Not really. The split of the church was more pronounced in the northern kingdoms. Here in Aille, and to a lesser extent, Caisel, not much changed. The edict of tolerance meant the other orders of the church could practice and proselytize, but the Merum church has remained dominant. The kings and queens of Aille tread very lightly around the Merum order. Every ruler for the past thousand years has had a Merum priest as their chief advisor.”
Gael rode next to me, and I caught her peering at the merchant women we passed, her gaze intent. I followed it and coughed, surprised by the amount of skin I could see. One woman had adorned her navel with an emerald, and her lightweight skirts had been sewn with slits that left most of her legs bare.
“Cloth must be more expensive here than in Collum,” I said. “They seem to be running short of it.”
Gael patted my cheek and laughed. “It’s a different climate and a different culture, Willet. You can’t expect people to follow northern customs under this sun.”
Ahead of us, a merchant in a very low-cut dress dropped her ledger and bent to pick it up. I held my breath as she retrieved it, then sighed in relief as the expected disaster failed to materialize. “And they must have some grace or physical gift I’m unaware of,” I quipped.
Gael laughed, and for a moment I forgot about vaults and assassins and all the rest of it.
The royal palace of Aille occupied a hill nearly as large as the one that sat beneath the cathedral. The design was the same—a perfect hexagon—but the hei
ght, width, and breadth had all been reduced, each dimension ever so slightly less than that of the cathedral.
“That’s not by accident,” Bolt said when he noticed me staring. “It’s a constant reminder that the church holds primacy here in Cynestol.”
We presented ourselves to the green-liveried guards at the gate, who snapped to when they saw the Archbishop’s seal on our letter. A moment later, we were dispatched in the company of one of the palace pages, a girl roughly of an age with Rory, with dark hair, deep olive skin, and rich brown eyes typical of the southern part of Aille.
We walked in our usual formation, Rory out front with Gael, then me, and Bolt bringing up the rear.
“How old is he?” our page asked Gael as she nodded to Rory.
I saw the corner of Gael’s mouth turn upward, but her voice remained neutral. “He’s sixteen.”
“He moves like one of the gifted,” our page said. “My name is Charisse. Is he presently without betrothal?”
“Am I what?” Rory coughed.
The page looked him up and down, like a horse trader searching for flaws. “My father is a third son but has risen to the rank of second minister of security. Though I have no gift of my own, my family can number almost fifty generations within the court of Cynestol.”
Rory stared at her, his mouth agape.
“Thank you, Charisse,” Gael said. “May your father’s house prosper and endure. Rory is serving as apprentice to Lord Dura’s guard, and questions of his betrothal will have to wait.”
Charisse received this polite refusal with equanimity and nodded. “Commitments should be honored—a rare and desirable trait in a husband.”
“A what?” Rory gurgled.
We stopped at the door to the chamberlain’s office, and Charisse bowed. “Please remember me if circumstances should change,” she said to Gael. “I have mastered the fifth part of the mathematicum, and my mother has instructed me in the marriage arts.”
Gael looked the rest of us over, her lower lip between her teeth in thought. “I’d almost forgotten about that part of court here in Cynestol.”
I pointed to the retreating form of our page. “You mean everyone is like that?”
She nodded. “Alliances and weddings are the national pastime. Be careful of what you say, gentlemen, or you may find yourself with a wife.”
“Wife?” Rory’s voice squeaked.
Gael nodded. “Here in Cynestol, you’re considered to be of marriageable age at fifteen. The courtiers will assume that since you’re gifted, you’re nobility.” She pointed to Bolt. “And the fact that you’re in the company of Tueri Consto, the last Errant, will only cement that in their minds.”
I started laughing.
“What’s so funny, growler?” Rory drawled in his fake accent. “You’re in the same boat, yah?”
I shook my head. “I’m already betrothed.” I stabbed my finger in the air at him and Bolt. “For once I can go into court and it’s everybody with me who has to worry.” I straightened. “I think I’m going to like it here in Cynestol.”
“Let’s get this over with,” Bolt said as he pushed through the chamberlain’s door. “With any luck Queen Chora died by accident and we’ll find her heir tonight. I hate this place.”
The chamberlain, Lord Unidia, a short fussy man with an ever-present glass of wine in one hand, took one look at our letter and our clothes and declared himself cursed by Aer.
“It can’t be done,” he despaired. “I can’t have them ready for court tonight.” He rounded on one of his assistants, a tall woman whose dress showed more than it covered. “Daicia, fetch the minister of court protocol. Perhaps he can shed some insight into this predicament.” He rounded on us. “Regardless, you all smell like horses. Unless they’ve turned court into a stable, that won’t do. Tressa”—he nodded to another woman, shorter and with luminous brown eyes—“show our guests to the baths, then bring them back here for clothes.”
He quaffed the contents of his glass and waved it in the air. An attendant refilled it for him. “I haven’t been to haeling in months.” He sighed. “That’s why Aer is doing this to me.”
The bath turned out to be an open-air pool fed from an aqueduct. I looked into its depth, trying to see the bottom. Rory whooped and jumped in, splashing water on the rest of us.
“Relax,” Bolt said as he walked down the steps into the water. He waded out into the middle of the pool, where the level stopped halfway up his stomach. “It’s only a little over a pace deep.” He shook his head. “You really need to learn how to swim, Willet.”
I half listened to Rory splashing and talking about how he never wanted to leave Cynestol, but I kept the remainder of my thoughts focused on our introduction to the nobility. “What can you tell me about court here in Cynestol?” I asked Bolt.
He poured soap out of a pitcher and proceeded to lather his hair. “The one thing you can count on with Ailleans and their court is change. They become enamored with a new trend and it spreads like brushfire through court and lasts about as long.” He dunked his head into the water. “I can’t really tell you what to expect because the last time I was here was twenty years ago as Pellin’s guard.”
I scrubbed soap through my scalp. “Is what Gael said true?”
He nodded. “Their penchant for marriage and alliance? That seems to be the one constant of court life.” One of his arms came out of the water to point at Rory. “We better keep him close at hand tonight. The women of Cynestol . . . well, you’ll see.”
A moment later, Tressa came storming through one of the arches, waving her arms. “What are you still doing in the bath? Hurry, or we’ll never get you to court on time.” She stood tapping one foot against the clay-tiled floor.
With a shrug, Bolt walked up the steps past her and draped himself with a towel. “Leave your clothes,” he said to us. “If you put them back on, they’ll just make you take another bath.”
“Move!” the woman yelled.
Rory and I exchanged looks. We weren’t moving toward the steps. In fact, both of us had edged toward the farther end of the pool.
“We’ll be along shortly,” I said.
Bolt, wrapped in a towel, tapped her on the shoulder. “What he means is that you’re a woman and they’re unused to being naked in front of women.”
Her eyes widened. “Are they priests?”
“After a fashion,” Bolt said.
She straightened. “Oh, well then, I’ll leave you to guide them back.”
A heartbeat after her shadow disappeared through the archway, I came out of the pool and wrapped a towel around my waist. Rory followed.
“Get used to it,” Bolt said. “Hot-weather customs are very different. Follow me.”
We returned to the chamberlain by the same route we’d taken and came into a room full of attendants surrounding him and another man who might have been his twin.
He came forward and grabbed Bolt by his chin, turning his face left, then right. I winced, waiting for my guard to knock him unconscious, but nothing happened.
“Hmmm. What’s his rank?” he asked the chamberlain.
“Errant,” Lord Unidia said.
He dropped his inspection to turn to the chamberlain with a smile. “Surely?” At Unidia’s nod, he bowed. “My thanks, brother chamberlain. Court brings so few challenges.” He turned back to Bolt. “Rest assured, honored Errant, I shall dress you in a fashion befitting your station.”
Bolt sighed. “And so it begins.”
Two hours and interminable changes of clothes later, the three of us stood just outside the entrance to court, the lilting strains of music drifting toward us along with the scents of strangely spiced food.
“Where’s Lady Gael?” Rory asked.
“It’s customary for women to arrive a few minutes after the men,” Bolt said, “or at least it was the last time I was here.”
A male attendant, broad-shouldered and muscled with chiseled looks even Duke Orlan might have envied, escorted Ga
el to us. I tried not to stare and failed miserably. Gael wore a floor-length dress that left both arms and one shoulder bare. Despite the short notice, the deep blue folds of her outfit appeared to have been tailored to her.
Exactly to her. A slit up the side exposed most of her left leg, and I had difficulty keeping my gaze above her shoulders.
“She is gorgeous, is she not?” the attendant asked, giving her an appreciative glance.
I didn’t care for the way his gaze lingered on the exposed bits of my betrothed. “Go away,” I said, my voice flat.
He bowed and turned on one heel.
Gael spun, and the shimmering fabric flared, showing both of her legs well above the knees. “Do you like it, Willet? I’m told it’s a bit conservative for Cynestol, but can you imagine the uproar this dress would cause in Bunard?”
“Who was he?” I pointed at the retreating attendant.
Gael’s throaty laugh mocked me. “Just a servant with muscles where his brains should be.”
I retrieved the other letter of introduction, the one to the royal seneschal, and stepped forward to the guards posted at the door. After reading the letter, one of them slipped inside, and a moment later, a gray-haired man with deeply tanned skin stepped through, his eyes lighting as his gaze swept across us.
“Finally, something different,” he said. “A lord and lady of the north and an Errant! Aer is kind.” He pivoted, showing us his back without saying anything more. “Follow me.”
He led us through a broad short hall to an archway where a trumpeter blew a fanfare. In a high, piercing tenor that only someone gifted could manage, the seneschal addressed the court.
“A rare treat is yours. From the farthest reaches of the north, from the city of Bunard in the distant kingdom of Collum, I present Lady Gael Alainn and her betrothed, Lord Willet Dura, with their attendant, Lord Rory.”
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