“Yes,” she said gently. “Unfortunately, both your sex and your country have barred you from any proper training. And your work does show many of the faults of your Cormalen brothers.”
“Primitive is in the eyes of the beholder, Your Majesty,” Merius said suddenly. “Safire has a great talent, whether she’s had ‘proper’ training or not.”
“Another loyalist like myself, I see.” The queen’s laugh was light, almost dismissive. “I agree, she does have a great talent, obscured as it is by rough edges. But I see many sketchers and painters with a great talent. It takes more than great talent to interest me.”
“So, what interests you?” Merius’s court face had all but disappeared. I realized then how young we both were, barely adults with only each other to rely on in this foreign place. I moved closer to him.
“Surely you know. Oh, come, my dears,” her voice had the barest hint of steel, “don’t play coy with a queen.”
She is the lioness on the tapestry outside the door, I thought wildly, and we’re caught between her velvet paws. Velvet for now, at any rate. I clasped Merius’s hand tightly, and he squeezed back, hard.
“Your Majesty,” I began, faltering. “Whatever your interest in me, I am flattered and honored. I am but a half-educated tomboy, come late to the graces of my station. The title ‘lady’ is mine only through the nobility of my father and the love of my husband, who saw fit to put his ring on my charcoal-smudged finger. So your interest flatters me, but forgive me for not understanding it.”
Her eyes narrowed through this speech, measuring me. “I can see now how you’ve survived this long.”
My heart dropped to my feet. “Survived?” I managed.
“Your fear, your suspicion, is understandable, given what Cormalen does to your kind. But you‘re not there anymore. There are no witch hunts here. We haven’t burned anyone at the stake in a hundred years.”
Merius‘s fingers were so tight they hurt. “Begging the pardon of Your Majesty,” he said through gritted teeth, “but I resent the implication that my wife is a witch.”
“Witch is an ugly word, a Cormalen word. We don’t use such titles here.”
“Whatever the title, whatever cloak you choose to give it, it is unfounded.”
“You’re brave, foolhardy even, to lie to a queen,” she said softly. “I’ll forgive it this once. Repeat it, however, and I’ll put you outside this chamber under armed guard.”
“Don’t hurt him,” I said, my voice half strangled. “He’s only . . .”
“Protecting you?” she finished in that same soft voice. “I know, my dear. It’s obvious you two love each other very much, perhaps too much to be sensible. What else could make the son of Mordric of Landers tell such a clumsy lie?”
Merius‘s intake of breath was painfully sharp. “Your Majesty,” he said quietly. “You should know that I have lately forsaken my offices and my inheritance because of a quarrel with my father.” I glanced back at him, my brows drawn together--where was he going with this? He ignored my look, his eyes on the queen.
“Yes, Radik told me as much,” she said.
Merius cleared his throat. “It was a quarrel over Safire. Whatever rumor he may have spread to this court, it’s not true.”
“Are you calling your father a liar?”
“Safire has some skill bandaging and caring for wounds, not something most noblewomen can do. Some in Cormalen believe it an unnatural skill, and my father is one of them. He thinks me bewitched, as I gave up my inheritance--well, you understand. A man, even a man as proud as my father, will do most anything to get back his only heir, even accuse an innocent of witchcraft and spread a false rumor.”
“How interesting.” The queen wore a faint smile. “I can see where that might happen. Except that Mordric hasn’t communicated with me since the Falsworth treaty eight months ago, and there‘s been no rumor of witchcraft at this court.”
“Then what could possibly make you think Safire a witch?” Merius sounded at his wit’s end.
The queen sighed. “This bluffing and stalling behooves neither of you. However, I’ll be patient because you’re young and, however wrongly, afraid for your lives. I had hoped to gain your trust, but I see I shall have to force it.”
She paced over to a draped easel in a corner of the chamber and ordered her handmaid to uncover it. Beneath was one of my sketches, framed and under glass. It was a rendering of the forecastle deck and bow rail of the ship we had sailed to Sarneth a month and a half ago. While the captain was out of sight, the sailor on watch played a game of dice with the cook. In the middle of the game, the first mate’s monkey snuck up and grabbed one of the dice. I had drawn the moment the monkey climbed up the rigging with the die, the cook and sailor swearing and trying to climb up after him. I smiled at the sight, for an instant forgetting our current predicament. Even now, the sketch seemed to change and flow with my memory, the monkey clambering up the rigging and casting the die to the deck with a rude chattering, the sailor almost falling in the sea as he pursued the naughty creature. Every sketch was like that, more a collection of images for me than a single image--so much more than I could capture on the parchment.
“Now,” the queen said, her skirts rustling as she began to pace again. “Do you still deny what you are?” Lord Toscar, the guards, even the handmaids all looked at me as if I’d truly been caught this time.
I gaped at her. “But Your Majesty . . .” I stammered. “What . . .” I glanced desperately at Merius.
But he was staring at the picture, not me. I’d never seen him look so blank. “No,” he said, beginning to shake his head. “No, it can’t be . . . no.”
“What?”
“The sketch, sweetheart. It’s moving.”
“But . . .” I trailed off, my throat closing as the queen stopped a few feet from us.
“Yes, it’s moving,” she said. “Was it worth trying my patience for this? It wasn’t as if it was a secret. You had to know that I knew, after I saw this sketch and the others that Radik bought. And you’ve been selling them down on the locks to all and sundry apparently. It amazes me you played so childishly coy with information that any could have for the looking. It makes me wonder at your upbringing.”
“But . . .” I began again, staring at the monkey leaping from rope to rope on the parchment.
“But what?”
“It’s moving,” I said stupidly. “It’s moving--I’ve seen it before, but I’ve always thought it was me.”
The queen opened her mouth as if to start another lecture, then closed it again, the tight lines between her brows fading to faint creases. She looked puzzled now, rather than stern. “You mean, you’ve never seen it before?” she asked finally.
I shook my head. “Not like this. I‘ve seen movement before, but it always seemed my own memory or imagination filling in the parchment, not something anyone else could see.”
“That’s what I’ve always thought it was, when I’ve seen it,” Merius said. “Either that, or the way the light hits it. Certainly I didn’t think anyone else saw it. If I had, I would never have let Safire go out to sell her sketches by herself, lest she be mobbed.”
“But . . .” the queen began. “You’re the artist, my dear. How could you not know it was more than a good imagination?”
“In their defense, Your Majesty,” Toscar said. “It’s not always so clear as it is today, and not all can see it. In fact, I would say most don’t see it, or if they do, discount it as their own imaginations. Falken didn’t seem to see it. Can you see it?” he asked the handmaids.
They both glanced at the queen through their veils. Finally, one, with a slight curtsy, said nervously, “No, my lord, I don’t see it. I don‘t quite know what you‘re talking about, in fact.”
“Neither do I,” said the other quickly.
“Well,” Queen Jazmene said after a long moment of uncomfortable silence. “It seems we’ve been talking at cross purposes this whole time. No wonder you’ve been s
o difficult; you didn’t know what I was talking about.” She forced a laugh. “You see it now for certain, though? Both of you?”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” Merius answered for us--my tongue was still knotted with shock.
“Good. We can proceed then. Radik?” She motioned to Lord Toscar. “Find Korigann and bring him here.”
Toscar nodded and immediately left the chamber. “Who’s Korigann?” I asked, my voice faint.
“One of my best master painters--he’s already seen the sketches and been sworn to secrecy. You’ll learn under him.” She smiled and reached out to pat my head. She meant it to be reassuring, but it made me feel like a prized pet. Perhaps she couldn‘t help it--she was, after all, a queen.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
When Merius and I returned home much later that evening, escorted by two royal guards, we didn‘t speak. Even after we left the guards at the front door and I quickly fried up the last of the bacon and mushrooms and some eggs for a late supper, all was silent. Merius had his eyes on his plate every time I looked at him. After several of these rebuffs, I kept my eyes on my food as well. If he looked at me, I couldn’t say. With no conversation, we soon finished eating. He shoved his chair back and put his plate in the dishpan before he headed for the bedchamber. Deciding not to bother with the dishes, I followed him. We shed our clothes in the dark and climbed into bed, still eerily silent. I punched my pillow, my eyes refusing to close. I sighed and shifted position, turning this way and that. Nothing was comfortable.
Suddenly Merius’s hand was on my shoulder. I grew still, my breath stopping as I waited to see what he would do next. He ran his fingers down my arm and clasped my hand. I turned over, facing him, and we were in each others’ arms, tangled together in a fierce kiss. He wrestled off my shift. His hands roused me easily and without his usual patience as he brushed the secret places of my body. With still not a word between us since the palace, we coupled with a quiet desperation as if we were trying to assure ourselves that the other was still there. I turned my head and bit a pillow lest I cry out, conscious all the time of the guards who were likely lurking outside our door. He clenched me harder at the end and uttered a low groan, but that was all; one would have thought we were frightened of the dark. Which perhaps we were.
Afterwards, we huddled together under the blankets though the night was mild, holding each other tightly. The silence went on so long that I thought maybe he was drifting off to sleep, when he whispered, his voice hoarse, “Lord Toscar was playing with us, the bastard, seizing you in the middle of the dance like that, calling the guard on me.”
“I bet she ordered him to do it.”
“He was enjoying it too much for it to be an order. I'm going with you tomorrow. They can’t stop me.”
“But they can.” I clutched him. “Dear heart, we’re not in Cormalen. We can’t . . .”
“I know that.” He sounded like he was biting the words as he said them. He was so accustomed to handling things, having the power of his position behind him--the Landers family was second only to the crown in influence. But that was in Cormalen. And he had given up his inheritance. It was a double-edged sword. He was no longer under Mordric‘s thumb, but then he could no longer depend on the Landers name to help us, either.
“You can't go with me tomorrow--you have guard duty," I reminded him.
“You know, if you hadn’t gone down to the locks against my wishes, Toscar would never have seen your sketches.” His tone stung.
“Are we going to argue about this again?”
“No, sweet.” He sighed. “I just wish you would have heeded me, that’s all. If anything happens tomorrow that makes you uneasy, you tell me, all right?"
"I'll be fine, Merius. Better than fine--I’ll be learning painting from a master, just what I‘ve always wanted.” Painting—my fingers suddenly itched at the thought of it as I remembered all those painters down on the locks. All those colors at my disposal, all the pigments and canvas I could want. And a teacher to guide me, a court portrait master no less. “A Sarneth master—they are the best,” I continued.
“That’s a matter of opinion.”
“Everyone says so, Merius, even the Cormalen masters.”
“Not everyone. In my opinion, you’re the best.” He planted a kiss on my forehead.
“The best freak,” I muttered as my initial excitement faded. Yes, I would be learning painting, but not because of my artistic skill. I would be learning painting because I was a witch.
“Oh God, don’t start this, Safire. You’re not a freak, all right?”
“I can’t help but think it . . . I didn’t even know I was doing it. If that’s not freakish, I don’t know what is. In what other ways am I a witch? What other spells have I been casting without even knowing it? It seems I’m a puppet to my own talents.” I sniffled and found, to my mortification, hot tears brimmed under my eyelids. I tried to blink them away, but that only seemed to make more.
How was it possible? I had sold so many drawings on the docks, and no one had noticed until now what a freak I was, not even me? Unless . . . I raised my head, my sobs stilled for an instant by a thought so startling, so terrible, that I couldn’t think it and cry at the same time. My talents were growing from a dark seed I had managed to conceal in Cormalen into a monstrous, grasping vine I could no longer control. Even my drawing was tainted. Now I would have to hide it, yet another piece of me to be locked away from the world. What next? I buried my face in my pillow, crying until my throat felt sore.
“Shh, sweetheart, please,” Merius hissed finally. “These doors and curtains are thin, and those guards are right out there.”
“To hell with them.” But I did try to muffle my sobs. “Merius, what are we going to do?”
“Shh, shh, it’s not so bad. Remember, you’ll be learning painting from one of your exalted Sarneth masters. And the queen is your patron . . .”
“Patron or jailer?”
Merius’s hand moved in my hair. “It’s a high honor, Safire. Every artist dreams of having a royal patron.”
“Thank you for putting the best face on it, but I know very well what would happen if we tried to leave here tonight. Those guards protect the queen‘s interest, not us.”
“You are the queen’s interest--and she seems good-hearted enough, not like Toscar.”
I turned to face him. “Do you think so? I thought them cut from the same cloth, except he’s more honest about it.”
“She was haughty, perhaps, but all royalty is like that.”
“She frightens me. She could have had you arrested, for nothing.” I stared into the darkness. We had pulled the bed curtains closed, but the edges didn’t quite meet. A sliver of moon shone through the chink, lighting a thin silver line across the rumpled blankets at our feet. That gap bothered me suddenly--what if one of the guards snuck in and peered through it? I upbraided myself for being so nervous, but the damage had been done--now I would worry about that damned gap all night. Clutching a blanket around my shoulders, I rose and closed the curtains.
“It wasn’t for nothing--she thought I was lying to her, which I suppose I was,” Merius said.
“You have a lot of courage, being so bold with her. I could scarcely speak.”
“You forget, I’ve been at court with my father since I was thirteen--it’s almost second nature for me, talking to these people.” Despite his dismissive words, he sounded pleased that I thought him brave. I smiled and nestled against him as he kissed my neck.
“Don’t be afraid, I’ll watch out for you,” he said softly.
“I know you will. I don’t know what I would have done if you hadn’t been there.”
“You would have been fine, though I‘m glad I was there to help you. Now, I don’t like this, but you’re right--we really have no choice, not at the moment. And I don’t think she, or even Toscar, means you any harm. They’re just interested in your sketches and what you can do with a paint brush and a little training. Just think of them as you would
any other patron, someone who comes up to you on the street for a portrait. That’s all they are, really . . . patrons.”
“Patrons,” I repeated, a bit uncertain. “I just try to ignore the crown. And the imperious manner.”
“That’s right. And be as stubborn and headstrong as I know you can be. You’re making priceless pictures for them, Cormalen rough edges be damned.”
“That really irritated you, didn’t it?” I wrapped one leg around him, my hand trailing up and down his back.
"I'm more of a patriot than I realized." He pulled me as close as he could, so close that I could feel the slight swell of my belly between us.
My hand paused on his hip. “Oh God, Merius, what about the baby?”
There was a moment’s silence. “How much longer do you think you can conceal it?” he asked finally.
“A month maybe, if that. What if she starts to ask questions? What if that Toscar looks into it? The ink’s barely dry on our marriage contract, barely dry on the annulment from Whitten. They‘ll know, and then where will we be? You said yourself King Arian would never have granted that annulment if he‘d known about the baby.” My insides twisted.
He put his finger to my lips. “We have a month--we’ll figure out something.”
“But what if we don’t, and someone in the Cormalen court gets wind of it? They’ll take me back to the House of Landers, back to Whitten . . .”
“No one’s taking you back there. No one, Safire, not as long as I have breath. I don’t care if they send the whole king’s guard.” He spoke with such conviction that I found myself relaxing in his arms, even as my mind raced ahead with visions of him getting hurt or killed by some fellow guard. Or another assassin. I had to stop thinking about this, or I’d never let him out the door. He had duties to perform, a vow to king and country to fulfill, and I couldn’t interfere with that. His assignment was already hard enough without a weepy wife.
Chapter Four - Mordric
The woman was young, perhaps twenty summers. Certainly no older than my son Merius. She stood at the end of the council chamber, her thin arms bound with an absurdly large rope, her hair cut almost to her scalp in the manner of all prisoners who slept in the lice-ridden straw of the palace dungeon. She didn’t look like a traitor, but then prisoners rarely looked as one would expect from hearing the dire descriptions of their crimes. Just last week, we had heard evidence against a nobleman who beat his brother to death over a woman after they spent a night carousing together. He had been a whey-faced, slope-shouldered sort who didn’t look capable of beating a rat to death, much less a man. Yet several saw him do just that. So one never knew just by looking at a prisoner. This woman didn’t look a traitor to the Cormalen crown, with her clear eyes and pale, fine-boned face, surrounded by a dirty halo of shorn blond hair. But that didn’t mean she wasn’t a traitor.
Tapestry Lion (The Landers Saga Book 2) Page 7