by Dave Duncan
Neither the King nor Montpurse had known what was happening, but Malinda had accused Sir Durendal of spying on her, harassing her, and meddling in her private life. Her enmity had begun then.
“Just after I was made chancellor, Dark Chamber agents caught the Princess and her current passion in compromising circumstances—meaning together in a dark corner. There was very nearly a major scandal. It was only to prevent one that the King refrained from throwing Commander Bandit and several other people in the Bastion—and me, too, when he found out that this was not her first flirtation. Kromman thought I was done for at that point. So did I.”
“It was the stupid little honey’s own fault!” Kate snapped. “Why she should have blamed you for it, I can’t imagine.”
Durendal shrugged. “She thought I’d set her up. She’d have done better to blame the inquisitors. And don’t be too hard on her. Ambrose had her examined by a panel of doctors and midwives to make sure she was still a virgin, and no sixteen-year-old would appreciate that humiliation. He decided to marry her off as fast as possible, especially because he was about to marry Princess Dierda of Gevily, who was a month younger than she was. He wanted no court jesters asking which was which. Then the queen of Baelmark died and he saw a way to end the war; kill two birds with one stone.” Better to offer his daughter than a humiliating apology…
“What did she think of the idea?” Quarrel asked thoughtfully.
“Princesses marry whom they are told to marry. Most of them do, anyway—I really thought Malinda would have to be driven aboard the ship at sword point, but no. She is her father’s daughter and she kept her dignity. She was convinced that the match had been my idea, though.”
Quarrel tensed. “Does she still think so, my lord?”
“I’m sure she does. In fact, I argued against it as strongly as I dared. The King told me to mind my own business. Parliament might have stopped him, but he didn’t need to call Parliament then, because Lord Snake was suppressing elementaries all over the place and gold was pouring in. He already had a son to succeed him. He was convinced he could father a dozen others on Dierda—he was not yet fifty. Besides, no king of the Fire Lands has ever died of old age. He expected Malinda to come slinking home to him as a widow very shortly.
“He was wrong on all counts. King Radgar still rules in Baelmark. Dierda proved barren. His son died that same year. Malinda has never written him a note and will not receive his ambassadors. He learned about the birth of his grandsons from public reports. If she cannot forgive her father, her feelings toward me had best be left unspoken.”
Obviously the Ironhall classes on the court had included little of this, for Quarrel’s eyes were wide. He was still eating, though.
“Perhaps he keeps her chained in a tower,” Kate remarked.
“The Dark Chamber spies say not. She seems healthy and happy and popular. Baelmark is not nearly as primitive as most Chivians believe, and Ambrose knew that. We assume that when he dies she will come home to claim the crown, but this may be wishful thinking. Her oldest son is almost eighteen, so she may send him in her stead. The only thing certain is that she will not tolerate me as her chancellor for an instant. I knew my term of office was drawing to a close even before Hagfish came to call today.”
“Hagfish, my lord?”
“Chancellor Kromman. He was nicknamed that by…an old friend of mine.” Montpurse again! Durendal’s conscience hadn’t died after all. Today it had taken on a new lease of life. Fertilized by fear, no doubt.
The conversation veered to lesser matters then, because Caplin returned, alerted by some stewards’ telepathy to the need to refill Sir Quarrel’s plate. The life-and-death question was whether Kromman and Malinda were already in cahoots. Was today’s sudden dismissal the start of the Princess’s revenge?
When the meal was over, Durendal settled into his favorite seat by the fireplace and watched Kate spin. Quarrel pulled up a chair between them. It would feel strange having the lad hanging around all the time, almost as if Andy had never gone. But Andy was thirty now, wrestling trade winds in the Pepper Islands. And this quiet home life was not going to last very long anyway.
“Durendal, my love,” Kate said, without looking up from her busily whirring wheel, “you described the Princess’s career in great detail for Sir Quarrel, but you did not explain why it involves him.”
“Ah! Forgive me! Well, a few days ago, the King sent that warrant assigning a Blade to me, with no explanation. I was puzzled. Angry, in a way. I eventually decided he was offering me a sort of farewell present. There are very few rewards he has not bestowed on me. I have declined many more, for excessive honors attract enemies. We have fought and argued bitterly for twenty years, but I always served his interests as best I could. Even when he was most enraged at me, he knew that. Rank and lands and wealth—everything he had to give, he gave me. One exception was a Blade.”
Quarrel nodded, frowning slightly. At his age, Wolfbiter had been led off by his ward to the ends of the world, but he had to sit here and listen to social gossip and talk of grandchildren. Durendal could not forget the dismay that had flashed across the boy’s face when he turned to greet his future ward. He had found an ancient, broken-down politician, destined for the scrap heap very soon. Although he had hidden that reaction instantly and skillfully—and ever since had shown no sign of resentment whatsoever—it must still rankle. Antiquated Lord Roland could not be as bad as the Marquis of Nutting, but he was hardly a cause to dedicate a life to. What could a fresh-minted Blade care about colic and teething troubles?
“It seemed that he was warning me not to count on his protection much longer. If he was admitting that, then he must have accepted the gravity of his condition at last. I decided to accept, mostly for his sake. I could have refused, because he is too sick to fight me now, but I could not bear to. I hope you will understand and forgive me.”
“There is nothing to forgive that I know of, my lord!”
“Flames, I do not need a Blade, lad! When I look at you I see a thoroughbred harnessed to a broken-down tinker’s wagon.”
“I see one of the great men of the age, my lord, and my heart swells with pride that I may serve you.”
No comment was possible except, “Thank you.” How could one so young be such a polished liar? It was disconcerting.
Quarrel’s eyes gleamed. “And with respect, my lord, I think you do need a Blade. The King thinks so. Aren’t you in danger? Isn’t that what her ladyship meant? Wasn’t Hagfish threatening you in your office this afternoon?”
“You can’t fight the government all alone, Sir Quarrel, and Kromman is the government now.”
“Flee the country!” Quarrel said triumphantly. “It is no shame, my lord. You have done nothing wrong.”
A jaunt to Samarinda, perhaps? It was close to midnight, so Everman must be almost as old as Durendal, heading fast into his morning senility. But at dawn he would be restored to youth—like Quarrel: supple, vigorous, beautiful.
Of course, Quarrel knew nothing of Samarinda. Travel to him meant exotic adventure, endlessly receding horizons. To Durendal it implied purposeless exile, waiting to die in some queer little foreign town, with no company but strangers and Kromman’s assassins lurking in door-ways. Flee the country he had served so long?
He seemed to have arrived back where he had started. Could that be exactly what the King had had in mind? But…
Kate said, “You have not explained to me why, after all these years, the King should suddenly promote Kromman to chancellor.”
“Because I don’t know why. I can only suppose that the man’s whining finally wore him down. They are shut up there together in Falconsrest—have been for weeks. Or it may be that he thinks a new chancellor will have better luck making the Princess see reason.”
She snatched up a skein of wool and hurled it at him. “Durendal, you are being excessively stupid!”
“My love?”
Quarrel’s surprise flashed to high amusement a
nd then polite inattention.
Kate’s cheeks were flushed, which they had not been a moment ago, so it was not the fire’s doing. “There is far more to this than you admit or even see. When Kromman brought that warrant, did you touch it?”
“Of course. I opened it and read it.”
“Have you handled anything else unusual today?”
What in the world was troubling her? “Dearest, you talk in riddles.”
Kate hugged herself as if she felt chilled. “Your hands smell of enchantment,” she said.
5
About a hundred possibilities flashed through Durendal’s mind and were discarded. “What sort of enchantment?”
“I don’t know, but I certainly do not like it! I have met it before somewhere. Sir Quarrel, my husband was not entirely truthful with you, but then I have not been entirely truthful with him. A week ago, when the warrant for your assignment appeared, he brought it home to show me. In twenty-five years he has never once discussed state business with me, because he is bound to secrecy by his privy councillor’s oath, but this was a personal matter.” Kate was obviously annoyed that she had to make such excuses; she must have a very good reason for doing so. She had never behaved like this before!
Quarrel nodded eagerly. Perhaps he thought the Roland household was always this exciting. “Of course.”
“He did not decide to accept the Blade the King offered. I decided. I talked him into it.”
“I am very glad you did, my lady.” Nobly said! Quite convincing.
“There was enchantment on that warrant, too.”
The men said, “What!” simultaneously.
Kate clenched her lips angrily for a moment. “I should have told you, dear, but it was very faint, so I was not quite sure of it. I am now, because it was the same enchantment I detected on your hands when you came home tonight. Whatever it is, it is no conjuration that ought to be around the court.”
“Some new healing?” Durendal suggested, but the glare he received dismissed his question as an insult to her intelligence.
Quarrel’s mind was more nimble or less hidebound. “Are you saying that these documents are fakes, my lady, or that the King himself has been enchanted? Is he the source of the conjuration?”
“I am saying that there is something seriously wrong, and now Kromman has had my husband evicted from court.” Kate never galloped off on wild byways of imagination like this.
He must believe her. “Could Kromman be the source of the enchantment?”
She shrugged. “If he is, he should not be allowed near the King. What are the White Sisters doing?”
“The King is at Falconsrest.”
Kate put a hand to her mouth in shock. “So he is!”
Quarrel glanced from one to the other anxiously.
Kate explained. “The lodge had been used as an elementary. What they did there I shudder to think, but it absolutely reeks of conjuration. The octogram is still there. I can’t go near it, even yet. No White Sister can.”
Candles were starting to gutter, and the library grew dim. Durendal threw another log on the fire.
“I don’t recall seeing any White Sisters at Falconsrest, but I probably did and just didn’t register them. There must be some!”
“In the village, not the lodge,” Kate said, frowning.
“But if enough enchantment is leaking out for you to detect it here, then they would have to be aware of it, surely?”
She nodded reluctantly. “That sounds logical. I wish I could remember where I met it before. It is horribly familiar. One of the suppressed orders, I suppose. You took me to a few of them.”
“Can you go back to Falconsrest, my lord?” Quarrel asked quietly.
“I’m technically under house arrest.” Kromman would use any such move as an excuse to have Durendal thrown in the Bastion—not that Kromman needed any more excuses. He tried to envision what might happen if he did go. Would Kromman be there or at Greymere? How would Commander Dragon react? Even if Ambrose was informed that his former chancellor had arrived—which was by no means certain—would he not just assume that Lord Roland had come crawling on his knees to ask for his job back? “The King would not receive me.”
“Where is Mother Superior?” Kate asked. “At Greymere or Oakendown?”
“I have no idea.”
“You can’t go to the palace, so I must go to Oakendown. I’m the one who’s blowing trumpets, after all. If she isn’t there I’ll dump the problem on the Prioress.”
He smiled at her admiringly. Even the short carriage ride today had fatigued her, yet now she was blithely talking of the much longer journey to the White Sisters’ headquarters, and in midwinter, too. “A letter would suffice, dearest. We can send Pardon with it.” Quarrel would be better, but Quarrel could not leave his side.
“The King was quite normal when you saw him, my lord?”
“Not unless you call dying normal. But if something happened—and I’m not convinced yet that anything has happened—then it must have been about Long Night itself, after my visit to Falconsrest and before he issued the warrant for your binding.” The handwriting on that had been surprisingly firm and legible, he recalled. Was that significant?
“Well,” Kate said, “we must sleep on it.” She rose, the men jumping up also. “We can sleep more soundly knowing we have a Blade to defend us from burglars.” She took up a candle and lit it at another.
Quarrel chuckled gleefully. “When you have the second Durendal beside you, ma’am? He would slaughter the whole gang of them before I could draw Reason from her scabbard. It is well known that that’s why the King never bothered to waste a Blade on his lordship.”
“He did have a Blade once. Didn’t you know?”
“Well, yes. He died overseas somewhere, didn’t he? I haven’t heard any details.”
That innocently smiling young scoundrel had been trying to worm the story out of his ward since they left Ironhall. Kate did not know that. What she did know was that Durendal had written a detailed account of the Samarinda adventure to be placed in the Ironhall archives after his death. She was the only person who had ever read it.
“Up there,” she said, “that black volume. You can reach—”
Durendal snapped, “No! I forbid it!” He was still bitter that Wolfbiter had not received the honor he deserved, but to spell out for his present Blade how he had failed his first one would be an intolerable humiliation. He turned to snuff out the candles.
Like the deadly bolt he was named for, Quarrel flashed across the room and caught Kate as she fell, scooping her up in his arms and stamping on the candle she had dropped before Durendal had taken a step. He strode over to the couch and set her down.
“Just a faint, I think, my lord. A healer…but she can’t, can she? Perhaps a cold compress? Summon her maid to loosen her, er, bodice, my lord?”
“Ring the bell.” Durendal knelt at his wife’s side, alarmed and furious at his own dismal performance and even more furious that he was worrying about that just now. All his life he had been fast and proud of it.
“No, I’m fine!” Kate said. “Don’t, please, Sir Quarrel. Just a slight dizzy spell.” She made a brave attempt at a smile and reached down to adjust the rumpled gown over her farthingale.
“Wine!” Durendal said, jumping up. Quarrel beat him to the decanter.
“A cushion for my head, dearest? Thank you.” She was still pale, but she laughed and squeezed her husband’s hand. “My, it is nice to have men dancing attendance on me like this. Relax, dear! I’m not having a baby.”
Quarrel almost spilled the wine he was offering her. In a moment, though, Lady Kate was sitting up, composed and insistent that she was recovered.
Durendal sat on the couch beside her. “I’ve never known you to do that before.”
“Neither have I! And you won’t again.” She pressed her lips together for a moment, thinking. “I got up too quickly. And the shock, I suppose. I remembered.”
“Remember
ed what?”
“Where I met that enchantment before. Give me your hand again.” She held it to her cheek. “Yes. It comes from Samarinda.”
Durendal’s mind shied away from the implications. His flesh crawled. Not that horror again, surely? Here in Chivial? “That’s what you sniffed? How could you possibly know?”
She set her chin as she did when she was not to be moved. “Because when you came back, you stank of it for weeks. If I hadn’t loved you so much and wanted you so much, I couldn’t have borne to be near you. It faded eventually, but I remember it.”
“It was the gold. The gold bones.”
“I don’t care what it was.” Kate shuddered. “Ghastly! But whatever contaminated you then is back on you now, and I smelled it on the King’s warrant, too.”
6
It was Quarrel who fitted the last piece in the puzzle, but that came in the morning.
Not for many years had Durendal found trouble sleeping, but too much had happened too quickly that day. As he lay wide-eyed in the darkness, listening to Kate’s soft breathing, he remembered the book and knew that Quarrel would be tempted to pry. The youngster had been officially given the dressing room outside the bedchamber as his own, but a Blade had no use for a bed. He might be anywhere in the house by now.
Which would be worse—having him learn all about Wolfbiter’s death or letting him know that his ward was too nervous to sleep? Could Durendal possibly get to the book first without being detected? He slid gently from beneath the sheets, found his dressing gown, and tiptoed barefoot to the door. Sneaking around in the dark when there was a freshly bound Blade in the house was not exactly prudent, but it was worth a try. He eased the door open. In the darkness beyond, a girl was whispering, “Oh yes, yes, yes…”
Sighing, the master of the house closed the door again.
Blades did have a use for beds.
He felt gritty-eyed and dejected when he came down to breakfast. The winter day was as gray as his mood, with casements rattling and rain beating on the panes. Quarrel glowed like a summer noon, working his way through a heaped plate of ribs and a tankard of spruce beer. He rose and bowed and beamed simultaneously. Kate smiled a wary welcome.