by Alma Boykin
Yes, and you charming ladies will not put your lives at risk for strangers over and over again, Elizabeth snapped silently. Nor will you be marrying anything more than a hitching post if you keep shrieking. Since the loud trio blocked the fastest route to the kitchen and dining room, Elizabeth staged a tactical retreat to her room. She grabbed her coat and coin pouch, changed house shoes for boots, and eased out of the residence. She skirted the edge of the still-busy courtyard and strode off into the twilight shadows to find an inn.
The dining room waiter gave her a curious look but made no comment as he showed her to a back table. Hot bread, beaten potatoes with bacon, marinated pork chunks, and pickled greenroot arrived with commendable speed and Elizabeth ate, then nursed a half-bottle of the inn’s white wine and tried to sort out what Lady Miranda had meant by “smelly horse prince.”
Surely not, she wondered. I thought… but it makes good sense to marry a Starland daughter to a Sobieski son or brother. The Poloki often provided horse troops, mostly scouts and light cavalry, to the Empire. Prince Bogumil, no, she reminded herself, he was now King Bogumil Sobieski, had considered Laurence of Frankonia as a possible match for one of his daughters. Laurence IV had rejected the query without so much as a moment’s hesitation. Or so rumor had it, according to Lord Armstrong. Armstrong had shaken his head, wondering if the offer had been nothing more than a way to push the Babenburgs into making a better dower offer or alliance. A Poloki-Frankonian alliance made no political sense. Well, it made sense if Laurence IV had intended to keep encouraging the Turkowi to attack the Empire, Elizabeth mused, finishing the last of her wine. But it will not happen now. And it was possible that Lady Miranda had meant one of the minor kingdoms-by-courtesy up on the northern end of the Tongue Sea. Elizabeth paid for her supper, flinching a little inside at the cost, and returned to Starland House.
She found Aquila Starland and a new horse both waiting for her at the imperial stables the next morning. She heard him before she saw him, as he laughed, “Only fell off four times? Would that I were so lucky!”
“Lady Elizabeth listens to direction. You, your grace, did not,” Major Wyler’s voice replied.
Elizabeth hesitated, wanting to eavesdrop and learn more about the duke’s adventures. No, then she’d be late and that only made the lessons harder, or so she’d been told. She walked around the corner, into the row of stalls for training horses. Duke Aquila and Major Wyler stood at a stall three down from where Gray loomed. The men turned when they heard boots on brick.
“There you are,” Aquila grunted.
“Your grace,” and she curtsied. “Major Wyler.”
Wyler ordered, “Tack up Mancusa and warm up, then come to the ring.” The men walked off, leaving her to introduce herself to the beast.
She learned that Mancusa did not like having her hooves examined and knew several ways to evade the bit and bridle. Mancusa learned that Elizabeth possessed patience, determination, and a willingness to use dirty tricks in order to get what she wanted. The mare sidled, puffed, ducked, tossed her head, and generally acted like a right sod. Elizabeth tolerated none of it and kept the bay mare on a tight rein during their warm up.
Aquila watched Elizabeth’s lesson from behind the ring wall. It proved to be a wise precaution: when Maj. Wyler flicked the long whip into the sand behind Mancusa, urging her into a canter, the mare jumped and began bucking and twisting. Somehow Elizabeth managed to stay in the saddle. She fought both the horse and herself, trying to keep relaxed and balanced, anticipating the mare’s next move as best she could. She lost one stirrup but held onto the reins and her riding crop. After what felt like hours Mancusa ran out of energy and settled into a bone-shaking trot. Elizabeth looked to Maj. Wyler, took a deep breath, and watched as the long whip hit the sand again. Mancusa lurched into a gallop that Elizabeth brought back to a canter, then a trot. “Good.” Elizabeth let Mancusa walk once around the ring. “You are dismissed.”
Aquila met her after she turned Mancusa over to a groom. “Right size but wrong horse, I think.”
“Your grace?” Elizabeth panted. She’d cracked ribs, if the pain in her back was anything to go by.
“That ball of temper and hooves is the correct size, perhaps just a little small, but you do not need to be retraining the horse as you learn. Both horse and rider come out the worse when that happens.” He shook his head. “Mancusa was a fine lady’s spirited mount, or so she was advertised.”
“I must respectfully disagree with the seller’s description,” Elizabeth replied, her tone as dry as dust.
Aquila chuckled. “As did the poor lady who first tried to ride her. The mare is a spoiled brat.” He sighed. “And I have been informed that you need new clothes. Ignorant male that I am, I think that is a matter for you to sort out on your own.” He handed her a leather pouch. “You’d better wash up first, unless you want to part the peeresses like Moses parted the Red Sea.” She caught the glint in his eye and wondered just how much he’d enjoy the sight of court ladies fleeing in fear. A great deal, she thought.
She curtsied. “Thank you, your grace. I will do as you suggest.”
Elizabeth returned to Starland House with a new coat and gloves, and receipts for the rest of her clothes and shoes. They would be finished by the end of the next week, or so the clothier and cobbler had assured her. She also carried more paper and ink, a blank book for her most important notes, and a white, woven straw box tied with green ribbon. Godown had smiled on her when she ventured into the wig shop.
Elizabeth was not smiling after supper, as she listened to Count Bierski warn Aquila and Matthew, “The talks with Frankonia have failed. We are alone against the Turkowi.”
Aquila blew a long stream of smoke before setting his nicotiana stick aside. “I trust his majesty was not surprised by the rejection.”
“Not at all, your grace. Painfully disappointed, but not surprised. Do the Frankonians really believe that the Turkowi would stop if they could conquer us?”
“I don’t know.” He turned to Elizabeth. “Do they?”
She considered the question and how best to answer it. “Your grace, my lords, I do not think that King Laurence looks that far ahead. He believes that he does, but from what I understand, he believes that he can play the Empire against the Turkowi, which allows Frankonia to move against the trading cities and the southern Confederation. Or against the Bergenlander.”
“But the Turkowi raid Frankonia, do they not?”
She nodded. “Yes, your grace, to the point that houses of refuge have been built for gravid women, well inside the borders.” He knew that already because she’d told him.
Apparently this was news to Count Bierski. “What? He does not protect his own people?”
“He does, my lord,” she ventured to correct him. “But through strategic defense instead of strategic offense. Because the raiders have only committed hit and run raids and murder, Laurence IV and V both provided defensive points through the houses of refuge. The Frankonian army is not organized to counter ferengrazias, or at least, to my knowledge it is not so organized.”
Matthew Starland looked up from the nuts he was shelling and snorted. “Well, the empire is on the strategic defensive but we prefer a tactical offense.”
Elizabeth pretended to ignore Count Bierski as he studied her with more than just friendly interest. Instead she sipped a little more of the sweet red wine, trying to decide if she liked it. The flavor struck her as too cloying, like the violet sweets that Sr. Amalthea had insisted that she make for Lady Orrosco. White wines were much more to her taste, another discovery she would not have made if she’d accepted Laurence’s plans for her.
The conversation strayed away from military to political gossip, and Elizabeth lost interest. The terms and names made no sense to her. I really need to learn the history of the Eastern Empire, she decided. Given that Empire seems to be an overstatement of the situation. Why was Rudolph of Babenburg negotiating with the Poloki and the Duke of Tivolia if h
e was the emperor? Emperors gave orders; they did not negotiate. And why did Count Eric Windthorst seem to dominate foreign policy? Laurence IV and V had not tolerated any attempt to manage their foreign policy.
She got to find out two days later. Elizabeth was putting Malcom, her new battle horse, through his paces under Major Wyler’s watchful eye. She and the gelding had reached a truce and she let him circle the ring in an extended trot, cooling off after a series of charges and self-defense drills. A tall, skeletal man appeared in the viewing area. She noted his presence but ignored him as Malcom tried to take advantage of her distraction and throw her. She kept him in hand and worked him in a tight serpentine between the poles. Only when she finished did she realize that Maj. Wyler had removed his hat and bowed low to the stranger. She walked Malcom until he cooled down, then rode over to the newcomer and dismounted, bowing.
“A fascinating adaptation, Major. Did you teach her that?”
The riding master shook his head. “No, your majesty. Duke Starland’s men provided her initial training.”
“And does it work?” He turned his gaze to Elizabeth.
Her heart pounded with more than just the morning’s exercise. “Yes, your majesty. At least, it worked on two Turkowi, your majesty, but they may not have been expecting resistance from a woman.”
Black eyes narrowed and his royal majesty Rudolph I of Babenburg inquired, “What were you doing fighting Turkowi, and where?”
“The first time I was trying to regain control of a scared mule, your majesty, and the second time I let my guard down and nearly lost my head as a result. Within the borders of the Starland lands, your majesty.”
“His grace reports that the ‘scared mule’ fights as well as the mule’s rider does, your majesty,” Maj. Wyler added. Elizabeth felt herself blushing under the men’s gaze.
Rudolph of Babenburg continued studying her. “Interesting. I begin to see why Aquila finds you so intriguing, Lady Sarmas.” She curtsied again as he turned and walked out.
“You are done for the day,” Wyland told her. “Tomorrow you begin working outdoors. Sidesaddle. And Malcom does not like coats or blankets or banners.”
“Thank you for warning me, Major, and thank you for the day’s teaching.” She touched her forehead with her riding stick in a salute. Malcom tried to hit her with his head and she poked him in the chest. “Quit,” she hissed. The hairy black gelding behaved himself after that.
Elizabeth returned to Starland House to find a command invitation and Lady Marie both waiting for her. “You have nothing suitable for this occasion,” the older woman informed her. “You were to remedy this.” Marie waved a graceful hand, indicating Elizabeth’s state of dress.
“Your pardon, your grace. I was not aware that I would need gowns suitable for formal court so soon, or I would have sought out a seamstress who could make them on short notice.”
“Unless you wish to make Starland the laughingstock of the ladies at court, remedy the lack at once, miss.”
“Yes, your grace,” Elizabeth agreed, curtsying as Lady Marie bustled off on other business. Well, now what? She tried to recall what she’d seen and where. No seamstress, no matter how clever and efficient, could have a court gown ready by the sixth hour after the noon bells. It was too bad she could not buy gowns in parts and stitch them together. Or could she? “Oh, yes, that would work,” she whispered as an idea struck her.
Even Lady Marie found nothing to disapprove of when Elizabeth appeared at five that evening. Instead of a gown, she wore a heavy skirt in dark blue and a heavily embroidered and beaded light blue jacket over a brown blouse. Her new boots peeped out from under her skirt and lace-edged wool petticoat. Elizabeth also wore her new wig, replacing her ugly, mousy blond hair with a light ginger-blond upsweep. She wished she could change her muddy hazel eye color as easily, but she’d been praying for that miracle for years without result.
She and Snowy followed the Starland coach. The mule acted happy to leave his stall and she decided that both of them needed to get outside the city walls. The little procession passed increasingly fancy houses, most with coats of arms or other paintings along the front. Suddenly the buildings changed. Seamless walls decorated with large windows rose tens of meters into the air. Elizabeth boggled and wanted to stop and stare at so much Lander work in such a small area. Instead Snowy accelerated, coming abreast of the carriage as they reached the palace gates.
The ornate metal panels slid open, allowing the Starland party to enter the royal district. Elizabeth noted the Lander buildings and the later additions, as well as the thick stone and concrete walls. The walls dated to the first Turkowi War, a hundred years ago. After losing part of the outer city wall to miners, the Babenburgs had taken no more chances. Elizabeth recalled reading that parts of the surviving city had been torn down and rebuilt, removing the old straight roads through Vindobona. Only within the royal precinct and around St. Gerald’s could one still find a grid. Elizabeth thought it was a sensible precaution. She also thought that tying her wig down had been a very good idea, as a cold east wind whipped between the fifteen-meter-tall buildings. She noticed hints of decoration despite the darkness and wondered what the paintings and carvings looked like. Then the group passed through a final gateway and entered a bulb-lit courtyard.
The display of wealth took her breath away. To have one lightning bulb powered by a tiny generator was a mark of prosperity and royal favor in Frankonia. At least two-dozen bulbs glowed around the walls, providing steady light for the lords and ladies as they stepped out of the carriage. Elizabeth opted to dismount without a block, landing lightly on her toes. Her thick socks helped cushion the shock. “Be careful,” she warned the groom who appeared. “He bites.”
The young man bowed his head. “We were warned about your battle mule, Lady Sarmas.”
She handed him her reins and followed the Starland family into the royal palace. The Babenburg family took its name from the structure. Baben had been the name of one of the survivors of the Great Fires, and “burg” supposedly meant “spring” in an ancient Earth dialect. Even at the time of the Landing, no one with any sense drank out of the Donau Novi, and Baben had used his control of the spring and sewage system to create the beginnings of the family’s power. That explained the wave-like patterns on the walls, Elizabeth decided. The group walked into a room with a beautiful fountain in the center, and the Starlands stopped, bowing and curtsying to the simple basin and pedestal of swirling, colored rock. Fragments of mirrors, now surrounded by plasterwork and mosaic, remained on the walls as a legacy of the Lander years. The group continued on, into a high-ceilinged hall decorated with paintings of the first Babenburg successes and victories. Elizabeth stayed behind the Starlands as they approached a cadaverously thin, dark-skinned man in dark blue clothes and a smaller, plump woman clad in dark green. The couple stood on a dais, armed soldiers on either side of the platform. As the Starlands bowed, Elizabeth curtsied deeper than she’d ever done for either Laurence.
“Well met, Aquila, Marie, Matthew, Miranda, Annie,” Rudolph declared. “And you, Lady von Sarmas, welcome to our empire.”
“Well met indeed,” Empress Margaretha agreed.
Aquila spoke for his family. “Thank you, your majesties. The honor is ours.” He turned, looking at Elizabeth.
“Thank you, your majesties, for such an unexpected honor and for the hospitality you show a wanderer such as I.” That seemed to be the right words, because Aquila nodded just a fraction of a hair and their majesties also nodded.
“It is a poor host who keeps his guests standing, especially guests as valuable as the defender of our borders,” Rudolph replied. Elizabeth wondered why he emphasized “valuable.” She had no value, unless… If he thinks I have a dower he’s in for a very unhappy surprise.
The imperial couple left the room. After a few moments servants appeared and indicated for the Starlands to follow. Elizabeth trailed along in their wake, not sure what else to do. As best she knew, Laure
nce V of Frankonia never held individual audiences, unless they were with select ladies, in which case the audience was very individual indeed; or so rumor maintained. She forgot to worry about protocol as she realized that the pictures on the walls dated to the Landing! Some had faded with the centuries, and a few showed what looked like patched holes, but to have such a priceless collection just hanging in a back hallway? The Babenburgs must be unimaginably wealthy, Elizabeth decided.
The table setting confirmed her guess. Beautiful glass and porcelain sat at the table, dozens of lightning bulbs provided smokeless and steady light that gleamed off of polished silver and brass, and bowls made of priceless plaztik held fresh fruit and flowers. “Lady Elizabeth, his majesty wishes to honor your uncle. If you would be so kind,” a footman in a dark brown and blue livery intoned, pulling out a seat near the head of the table. Too surprised to speak, she nodded and took her place, standing beside the heavy chair. Marie had told Elizabeth that Rudolph might use a different title, if he chose to speak to them privately, and indeed, once everyone found their seats, a voice announced, “Their graces the Duke and Duchess of Courtland, Lord Thomas, Lord Alois, Lady Aranka, and Count Gerald Kazmer.” The younger Babenburgs looked much like their mother, but with their father’s coloring, and Elizabeth suddenly saw the connection between Lady Marie and Rudolph. Rudolph’s brother Gerald Kazmer sat beside Elizabeth. He shared his brother’s coloring and height, although not the unhealthy thinness.
She did not remember much of the meal. What Elizabeth remembered was Marie’s angry look when Emperor Rudolph insisted that Elizabeth join the men after supper, and the subsequent discussion. She followed the men to a dark, warm, book-lined library. On one wall hung an enormous map of the crown lands and Poloki holdings, dating to just after the Great Fires, or so she guessed. The men took seats in front of a huge, tiled fireplace. The servants set out wine, beers, and juices to go with the cheese and nuts, then retired, leaving the men and Elizabeth alone.