King's Blades 01 - The Gilded Chain

by Dave Duncan

  chamber, making a final curtsey with one hand on

  the doorknob and the other clutching files. Her

  age was a state secret, for a black gable

  headdress concealed her hair and her pale moon

  face bore no wrinkles. She turned and began

  to cross the anteroom in the shuffling,

  flat-footed walk of the grossly fat, black

  robes whispering around her ankles. Her fishy

  gaze swam from face to face as she went, noting

  exactly who was present and who sat next

  to whom. No one would look her in the eye except

  the Blades, who stared back coldly--a point

  of honor, to prove they had nothing to hide.

  The Chamberlain gathered up more papers and

  hastened in to learn His Majesty's pleasure.

  Durendal headed for the desk.

  Words whirled in his head: Your Majesty,

  I crave a boon. Utterly ridiculous!

  Sire, may I humbly beg a favor?

  Better. The King would certainly consent. Married

  by royal prerogative!--it would amuse him.

  He loved to flaunt his power, especially if the

  demonstration did not cost the Exchequer anything.

  Durendal was, after all, one of his

  favorites. Montpurse should have been advised

  beforehand, but would understand. Married! To Kate! No

  doubts, no hesitation. What a woman! But

  first, of course, he must get by the Chamberlain.

  "I seek a brief audience with His Majesty

  concerning personal business." Personal business

  might take months! He certainly must not try

  to bring it up when it was his turn to stand guard in the

  council chamber itself. That would call down royal

  thunderbolts, even on him.

  The Chamberlain emerged, but he hung onto the

  handle and peered shortsightedly around the

  anteroom. "Ah, Sir Durendal!

  Thought you were here. Just the man. His Majesty

  wants you."

  Even for a Blade who prided himself on his fast

  reflexes, this afternoon was moving a little too quickly.

  He straightened his doublet and his shoulders, then

  walked into the inner sanctum.

  The council chamber was a square room,

  poorly lit by mullioned windows at the far

  side and made gloomy by paneling of black

  walnut and a dozen dark leather chairs set around

  the walls. One of them was piled with an untidy

  heap of red dispatch boxes and a snowdrift of

  spilled documents. The two high fireplaces

  were white marble, but neither was lit.

  The chairs were sometimes offered to foreign

  ambassadors. Everyone else--ministers,

  officials, petitioners; high and low, male or

  female--remained standing because the King did.

  Hoare, the Guard humorist, maintained that if the

  King sat down, you tried to remember when you had

  last updated your will, but if he began to pace it

  was too late to worry. He was an erratic

  worker, driving his ministers to desperation by refusing

  to look at a single paper for weeks, then working

  them for days and nights until they were half dead of

  exhaustion. He could snatch the substantive

  points out of a long-winded report like a sparrow

  hawk taking sparrows. His memory for detail was

  legendary, his temper even more so, his tenacity

  infinite. He made the policies. His ministers

  found ways to carry them out. Or were carried out

  themselves, Hoare said.

  The lamps had not been lit. He was brooding

  by the window, peering out at the sunset and darkening the

  room like a hay wagon. Durendal walked to the

  center of the room, bowed to that massive royal

  back, and then waited. Never before had he been more

  than a single pace from the door.

  The King swung around and grunted as if

  surprised. He pointed vaguely at a group

  of chairs. "Sit. I need to think."

  Fire and death and more fire! Durendal

  obeyed, although his scalp prickled. He could not

  recall anyone sitting when the King stood.

  Invalids, no one else, not ever.

  The King put his hands behind his back and began

  to shuttle--door, window, door. "I made a

  mistake once. Now I'm going to make

  another."

  Silence was the only possible comment.

  Window, door ... "I suppose I'm just

  pigheaded. Hardest part of being a King--being any

  sort of leader--is knowing when to quit. You've

  wounded the quarry, you've tracked it all day, and

  now night is coming. Do you give up and go home?

  Lose all that effort? Or do you push on, knowing

  you'll have to spend the night in the woods and may

  gain nothing? Hmm? How do you decide?"

  He seemed to be speaking to himself, but he

  suddenly stopped and peered at his uneasy

  Blade.

  "Hmm? Well? Which?"

  "I've never known Your Majesty to give up

  when there was any hope at all."

  Grunt. "Pigheaded, you mean. You're

  probably right. If I send you, can you go?"

  "Huh? I mean--"

  The King snarled impatiently. "You will be gone

  some time. Can you stand it, or must I release you

  first?"

  Release? Durendal shivered. Blades

  notoriously resisted being released from their

  bindings, although most of them were very relieved to be

  free of them afterward. Unexpectedly faced with that

  dread prospect, he felt a surge of

  panic. Of course, he would then be able to snatch

  up his barony, marry Kate, do all sorts of

  things with his life. ... No, unthinkable!

  The alternative, though, seemed to be to be

  absent from his ward for an extended period, and that

  might be torture unendurable. But at least it

  would be temporary, and the other permanent. He

  wiped sweat out of his eyes. "I think I can

  trust Commander Montpurse to take care of you,

  my liege."

  The King beamed. "Good man! Remember

  Everman?"

  It took a moment. It had been six years.

  "Candidate Everman? Three behind me at

  Ironhall."

  "That one. The one who got the job I wanted

  you for."

  No reply was required except a faster

  heartbeat.

  "He's still alive," the King said. "We have an

  agent in Samarinda. Sends reports in every few

  years. This time he reports that there's a

  Chivian-- You don't know any of this, do you?"

  He peered suspiciously at Durendal.

  Fortunately, it was possible to answer

  as truthfully as if he were being put to the Question.

  "Nothing at all, sire. There were rumors that he

  had been bound to a mysterious gentleman whom no

  one had ever heard of and they both disappeared. Nothing

  more."

  "Master Jaque Polydin, merchant,

  adventurer, perhaps a trickster." The King cleared

  his throat uneasily. "It's a long story.

  Grand Inquisitor will provide you with the

  details. There were reports that the knights of

  Samarinda owned the p
hilosopher's stone--the

  gadget that turns lead into gold and lets you

  live forever. If you ever breathe a word of this around

  court, my boy, I will have you shortened by a head!"

  "I understand, sire." The King had been younger

  then, and every man was entitled to a few youthful

  follies. He'd been older than Durendal was

  now, though.

  "Grand Inquisitor will explain. I assumed

  they were both dead, but apparently Everman is still

  alive, fighting as some sort of gladiator. Of

  course, the news is two years old, so he

  may be dead now. But I won't have it, you hear?

  I won't have one of my Blades turned into a

  performing bear! Go and get him back."

  "Yes, sire." Durendal rose to his

  feet, but he felt as if he were falling.

  What else could a man say when the bottom

  dropped out of his world? It was the challenge of a

  lifetime. Where was Samarinda, that news took

  two years to arrive? Not even in Eurania.

  Oh, Kate! He could not refuse an order from

  his liege. He could protest and explain, but

  something as strong as the binding prevented that--pride.

  What a fool Kate had been to fall in love

  with a Blade!

  The King studied him for a moment and then smiled

  grimly. "Or at least find out what happened.

  Create another legend! I don't want

  to lose you, but I can't think of any other man

  to choose. Only you. See Grand Inquisitor

  in the morning. She'll assign one of her own men

  to accompany you. And Privy Purse will

  provide all the money you need. May the spirits

  favor your cause."

  Dismissal--so easily may a prince send a

  retainer to his death.

  How? When? Where? Who else? Take

  what? All those matters were being left to his

  discretion. It was Ambrose's way.

  Mind racing, Durendal said, "One question,

  sire?"

  "Ask Grand Inquisitor."

  "Your orders, sire? Am I to bring him

  back whether he wants to come or not? And further

  ... what about the philosophers' stone?"

  The King opened his mouth and seemed to think better

  of what he had been about to say. "Use your own

  judgment. I can't make decisions at the other

  side of the world. That's why I picked you. It's

  your enterprise; do what's best. Oh, yes, before

  you go ..." He stalked over to the paper-littered

  chair and began to rummage in a flurry of

  vellum and parchment.

  Kate, Kate, Kate ...

  Other side of the world?

  He could resign! He had a barony in his

  pocket, and the King had given him the right to claim

  it at any time. No, his binding would not let him

  exercise that right, as the King had known all along.

  And to mention Kate now would seem like cowardice and

  weaseling out.

  "Ha!" The King had found what he wanted

  down on the floor. He heaved himself upright again.

  "I keep meaning to amend the Ironhall charter.

  Allowing boys of fourteen to choose their own names

  is utter ... Ahem. Nothing personal, you

  understand. Nothing wrong with your name, and you have amply

  lived up to it. You may be the Durendal by the time

  you're finished."

  "Your Majesty is gracious."

  "Sometimes. When I have my foot in my mouth,

  I am. But what about Sir Snake, for

  example? Now we have Candidate Bullwhip.

  Young idiots! The current Prime is

  Candidate Wolfbiter."

  Durendal had planned to be Bloodhand if

  they wouldn't let him be Durendal. "I believe

  there are precedents for all those names, sire."

  "Yes, or Grand Master wouldn't have allowed

  them. Anyway, Grand Master says this

  Wolfbiter is the best thing they've produced

  since you. I've been saving him for something

  special. Now he's turned twenty-one and

  he's tearing the walls down."

  Hardly surprising! "I look forward

  to meeting him."

  "Well, you will. Here." The King thrust out a

  parchment sheet bearing the personal signet.

  "He's yours."

  Durendal bowed and closed the door. For a

  moment he just stood there, staring at the oak panel

  in front of his nose, sick with the thought of what he

  had done. Oh, Kate, Kate, Kate!

  He had given the king the best six years of his

  life and owed him nothing more. By any sane standard

  he should have demanded his release then and there and carried

  his beloved off to whatever that estate of his was called

  to happily ever after. The knowledge that his binding had

  overruled his own desires and judgment was no

  consolation at all.

  But what was done was done. He turned and

  beckoned the nearest page. He bent to whisper

  into a none-too-clean ear. "Go and find two

  Blades. I want them, the first two you see.

  Say please if one of them is Commander

  Montpurse, otherwise don't."

  The lad bowed and hurried off, impressed with his

  sudden ability to give orders to Blades. The

  Chamberlain bustled away into the King's presence.

  Durendal sat down at his desk, ignoring all

  the curious and disapproving faces. He selected

  a blank sheet of parchment and wrote out his will,

  leaving everything to Kate. Most Blades would have

  nothing to bequeath, but he owned a manor he had

  never seen. He had no idea what it was worth.

  Then he took another sheet.

  Grand Master:

  You are hereby authorized and requested

  to prepare Prime for binding on the night of the

  fifteenth instant.

  Done by my hand and in the King's name this

  fourteenth day of Thirdmoon, in the three

  hundred and fifty-seventh year of the House of

  Ranulf.

  Durendal, companion.

  He folded the papers, held wax in the candle

  flame, sealed them with his ring. He wandered over

  to rejoin Scrimpnel and Parsewood, enjoying

  their baffled stares and hoping his own face was not too

  scrutable.

  "Whose throw?"

  "Yours, obviously," Scrimpnel said. There

  were two groups in the Guard now, and he was one of the

  young ones, those who had not been in on the

  Nythia campaign. Good man with a rapier,

  though. "May spirits of chance favor you wherever you're

  bound."

  "Writing out your will?" asked Parsewood, who

  was newer yet, but a powerful saber fighter and

  clearly another good guesser. "You won't tell

  us a thing, you big bastard, will you?"

  Before Durendal could frame a reply with enough

  scathe, the door swung open to admit the most

  recent Blade of them all, although even he had

  several months' experience now--a reminder of just

  how long the King had kept the respected

  Wolfbiter dangling. Despite His

  Majesty's disapproval, Sir Snake's name

  was apt, he being about as long and as slender as ar />
  Blade ever was. He affected a thin mustache,

  a supercilious manner with a nose to match, and he

  sat a horse like the shine of its hide. He would

  do very well.

  Durendal sprang up and intercepted him before

  he could join the group. He passed him the letter.

  "Deliver this to Grand Master, no one else."

  The kid raised his eyebrows. "The Moor?

  Tonight?"

  "Yesterday. And keep your mouth shut, totally.

  Report to Leader when you return."

  "But tonight is the--" Snake took another

  look at the deputy commander's face. "At

  once, sir."

  As he went out, Chefney came in.

  Excellent! His luck was holding.

  "Take over from me here, please, brother?"

  Chefney nodded, curious but not questioning.

  Durendal followed Snake out, almost colliding

  with the returning page. Kate was no longer in the

  hall, but that was to be expected.

  He tracked down Montpurse as he left

  the fencing gym. A distinctly frosty stare

  suggested the Commander already knew there was something

  afoot and he had not been informed. He still looked

  no more than fifteen.

  "I've been detached for special duties,"

  Durendal said. "May be gone some time. Will you

  hold this for me--it's my will--and see my things are

  put in a safe place? The cups are worth a

  fair bit."

  The Commander's face went bleak. "Talk

  to Chancery. That's their job, and Blades can't

  always keep promises. Friend ... I'm going

  to miss you."

  "These things happen. He's the boss."

  "Yes." Montpurse's ice-pale eyes were

  asking how bad it was.

  "I'd like you to wear my sword breaker for me,

  though."

  "I'll see it's kept safe." He was not

  going to wear it, obviously, any more than his

  deputy would say where he was going. "Is this

  good-bye?"

  "I'll leave tomorrow." Durendal told him about

  Snake and the changes that would be needed in the duty

  roster. Then there was nothing more to say and nothing left

  to do except go and find Kate.

  He headed first for the White Sisters' quarters.

  Crossing the western courtyard, he saw her coming

  toward him. They both began to run, shocking

  several elderly sniffers and a few grandly

  dressed courtiers. Before they even met he

  watched the hope die in her eyes and wondered if

  his face was as readable to everyone or if women were more

  perceptive than men.

  They embraced in an impact that should have