by Dave Duncan
“Ugly brutes!” he said.
She turned her head with a frown. “I think they’re beautiful.”
“You’re not standing where I am.”
He had always been puzzled by the fact that he could never predict a person’s laugh until he heard it. The largest men might titter and the smallest women guffaw. She had a wonderful laugh, like birdsong.
“You are flattering me already, Sir Durendal!”
“You know my name?” He pretended surprise, although everyone knew his name.
“You have quite a reputation.” She had a lovely smile, too, and eyes of cornflower blue. He presumed her hair would be the same gold as her eyebrows, but it was hidden by her veils and hat.
“What sort of reputation?”
“I don’t think we should both indulge in flattery. It might be dangerous.”
“I spurn such danger.” He proved it by moving closer.
“That’s part of the reputation.”
This was definitely promising, but before his hopes soared any higher he must discover if his binding made him repugnant to her. “I have been told that White Sisters can detect Blades at a considerable distance.”
“Thirty paces or so. Less in a crowd.”
“Upwind or downwind?”
She laughed again. “Any wind. I could detect you behind a wall, too, or in the dark. Your binding is a powerful enchantment.”
“Detect how? You really sniff?”
She smiled. “That’s an old superstition. Not by smell nor sight nor touch nor sound, and yet by all of those. Explain color to a blind person.”
“I asked you first. What does a Blade look like, otherwise than other men?”
She considered, head tilted cutely. “More intense. A Blade in a group seems more solid, more important, I suppose. Detecting conjurements is my duty, after all, and my skill. A dagger in a box of kitchen knives.”
“This is very interesting. And hearing? You can tell by my voice?”
“Even when you are silent. All the time. Like the highest note on a trumpet, very high, very clear…. That sounds unpleasant, but it isn’t. Sort of rousing.”
“Rousing?”
“In a military sense,” she said hastily. “And as for smell, you know that dry sort of odor from very hot iron?”
“The smell of the Forge, I expect.” He laid a hand on hers. “And how do I feel?”
She stiffened. He feared he had moved too soon, but she did not snatch her hand away. She turned it over, so that they were palm to palm.
“Strong.”
“So a Blade is not too horrible to be with?”
“One could get used to it.”
“Would you begin by accompanying me to the masque tomorrow?”
She looked up in astonishment. “Oh, I should love to! You mean it?”
They parted an hour later, when he had to go on duty. He had forgotten to ask her name. He knew it by the end of the masque the next night, and he also knew that this was a fish he wanted to land. He must play his line very carefully.
Kate had other ideas. On the afternoon following the masque, as they strolled hand in hand under the spring blossoms, she said, “This dramatic sword-through-the-heart ritual, does it leave a scar?”
“Two—one front and one back. I have four.”
“I should like to see those.”
Earth and fire!
He led her to his quarters—a small room, poorly lit and cramped by an oversize bed. He locked the door, for the Blades had informal ways among themselves, but she did not protest. She turned to peer at the lithographs on the wall, while he went over to stand in the light under the window. As he removed his doublet, then his shirt, he could feel his heart pounding as it had not pounded for a woman in years. Then she turned. He held out his arms; she came to them.
She ignored his scars completely.
He knew very soon that she had no experience of love-making. He did, though. He was skilled and, in this case, extremely careful. And extremely successful.
Later, as they lay entwined, he said many things, but one of them was, “You astonish me. We have only known each other for two days.”
She snuggled even deeper into his embrace. “I have loved you for months. For weeks I have been putting myself in your path and you never seemed to notice me.”
“I did notice you. I was always frightened that you would think…that you might find a Blade unpleasant at close quarters.”
“Very pleasant.”
“Trumpets and hot iron, daggers…what am I now?”
“Mm?” She stroked the hairs on his chest. “Like being in bed with a sword.”
“A naked Blade, you mean?”
“Exactly.”
“Months, you say? Then I have a lot of catching up to do.”
She sighed and stretched her body against his. “Begin now.”
4
He was on duty in the antechamber the following day with Parsewood and Scrimpnel, surreptitiously rolling dice on a cushion so they made no noise, while pointedly ignoring disapproving stares from the officials who waited endlessly in the big brocade chairs and understood perfectly that the Blades would not misbehave like that if there was anyone of real importance present. Dusk was falling, pages were lighting the lamps, the Chamberlain fussed with papers at his desk. From time to time a secretary would shuffle in and out again.
The antechamber was boredom incarnate. Eavesdropping on what went on in the King’s presence could sometimes be interesting. At least one Blade was normally present when the King granted audience, but at that moment he was receiving Grand Inquisitor, and not even Blades overheard her reports.
The outer door opened a handbreadth to admit a pint sized page, who scurried over to Sir Durendal and handed him a note, thus prompting sarcastic whispers about billets-doux from his insubordinate subordinates.
Must see you. Very urgent. K.
It had better be urgent! Cataclysmic!
Ignoring all the curious and disapproving stares, he went over to the door and peered out. She was right there, with the two men-at-arms scowling at her. Montpurse would have him racked for this, but his anger melted as he saw her pallor. She would never weep, but something was very wrong.
“Quick!”
“I’ve been reassigned!” she whispered. “First thing in the morning.”
“No!” Then quieter, “To Oakendown?”
“No. To Brimiarde. It’s a new posting.”
“How long?”
“Probably forever.”
To lose her so soon? It was unbearable. “Will you marry me?”
“What?”
“They won’t transfer you if you’re married. Marry me.”
“But, but…but we can’t! There isn’t time. It takes days, weeks…. I need permission from—”
Parsewood coughed. Durendal glanced around and saw the door to the council chamber already opening.
“No, it doesn’t. I’ll ask the King to declare us man and wife. Then it’ll be done. You agree?”
She gasped, took one breath…. “Oh yes!”
“I adore you!” He closed the door and moved away from it, aware of amused grins from Scrimpnel and Parsewood and wondering what the men-at-arms thought.
Grand Inquisitor backed out of the council 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 philosopher’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 amen
d 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.”
5
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.