The King's Road

by Cecelia Holland

  The King’s Road

  Cecelia Holland

  © Cecilia Holland 1970

  Cecilia Holland has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.

  First published in 1970 by Atheneum.

  This edition published in 2015 by Endeavour Press Ltd.

  Table of Contents

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter One

  FEDERIGO settled himself comfortably on the branch and peeled another orange. The juice of the first had made his chin and fingers sticky, and the heavy, tart odor filled his nostrils. Among the masses of dark green leaves all around him, he could see the ripe fruit hanging like golden balls — like the tree in the legend, that grew at the end of the world. He tore off half the peel and sank his teeth into the sun-warmed pulp, and more juice flowed over his chin and splashed on his shirt.

  Through the branches, he had a good view of the road that ran along the plain just beyond the wall of the orchard; he could see a little band of horsemen riding up from the city of Palermo toward the royal palace of Al-Aziz. Among the bay and chestnut horses, a white mule trotted. That would be a Papal Legate — an ambassador of the Pope to Sicily. Monks always rode white mules. Federigo gulped orange juice and watched them ride carefully along the rocky road, followed by a small group of boys from the city. The boys were running in and out of the troop of horses, shouting. Federigo could tell that the men were getting angry.

  “Whoever’s up in that tree, come down or I’ll give you a beating.”

  Startled, Federigo nearly fell off the branch. He looked around until he saw the man who had yelled — the big, gray-bearded farmer who owned the orchard, and who was striding forward with a pole raised threateningly in his hand. The boy wiped his chin hastily on his sleeve.

  “Don’t worry, Master, it’s only me — Federigo.” He swung down from the branch, hung a moment at arm’s length, and dropped to the ground almost on top of the farmer.

  “Oh, well,” the man said, and smiled. “They’re good oranges, aren’t they?” He reached out and tousled Federigo’s hair. “Why don’t you come in the front gate next time?”

  Federigo grinned. “Because it’s more fun to climb the wall, Master. They’re beautiful oranges.” He turned and started toward the wall at a trot.

  “I’ll send you some if you want,” the farmer called.

  “Don’t do that.” Federigo jumped and caught the top of the stone wall, hitched himself up, and swung around to sit on the edge. “Diepold would only eat them all.”

  He waved, and the farmer laughed and went back through the trees toward his little white house, which Federigo could just make out beyond the orderly rows of the orange trees.

  The procession of the Papal Legate was drawing nearer, still accompanied by the swarm of boys. Beneath the plodding hoofs of the horses, the dust rose in a fine, golden cloud, lit by the late sun. One of the Legate’s knights was bellowing and waving at the boys, trying to shoo them off; his broad red face glowed with bad temper. Federigo crossed his legs and watched, grinning. He knew the boys, he played with them all the time; and the threats and curses of a pack of knights wouldn’t drive them back one inch. His hands were covered with sticky orange juice and bits of peel and pulp, which he tried to wipe off on his shirt.

  Astride his mule, the Papal Legate looked uncomfortable and angry. Federigo tucked his legs under him and watched. The Pope was the overlord of the King of Sicily, and Papal Legates were always coming down to Palermo, but this one was a stranger to him. The man on the white mule drew abreast of him and reined up, scowling. His pale eyes glared at Federigo.

  “Is Sicily peopled with nothing but beggar boys?”

  Federigo grinned. He knew how he looked — covered with dust and orange scraps, his red hair standing on end — and he could tell that the Papal Legate didn’t know who he was.

  He called, “Excellency, are they bothering you?” and gestured toward the howling mob of boys dashing in and out of the group of knights. “If they are, I’ll send them away.”

  The Legate’s fat red face turned redder still. His fine clothes, studded with jewels, were covered with a film of dust, and blisters showed on his hands; obviously he wasn’t used to handling the reins even of a mule.

  He said, “Thank you, no. I’d advise you to get down from there before someone comes along to throw you off.”

  “Oh, nobody would do that.” Federigo cocked his head to one side. “Why are you going to Al-Aziz?”

  The Legate sputtered angrily. “Now, see here, I’m not about to talk state business with beggars in the street. Get along with you.”

  “You can talk about it to me.” Federigo leaped casually down from the wall. He walked over to the mule, which tried to bite him, and slapped its muzzle. The Legate gasped, and a few of the knights muttered in surprise. “I’ll go up there with you,” Federigo said cheerfully, “if you’ll give me a horse to ride.”

  The other boys had gathered behind Federigo and were quiet. He glanced around to grin at them. Durante was there, and Yusuf. He swung back when the Legate said angrily, “Why should I give you a horse to ride?”

  “Because,” Federigo said, “my name is Federigo, and I’m the King of Sicily. I’ll take that bay horse, there.”

  The knights all around the Legate stared at him, and the Legate turned pale. His mouth worked nervously. Covered with dirt, shaggy-headed and barefoot, the boys crowded around Federigo.

  Yusuf called, “Little Red, are they from Rome?”

  “I think so,” Federigo said. “They certainly look like it.”

  The Legate was telling the knight on the bay horse to dismount and ride double with someone else.

  Durante drew closer to Federigo and whispered, “Make them give us something. The Pope is rich.”

  “I can’t,” Federigo said softly. “They’d tell Diepold, and Diepold would have me whipped.” He made a face. The knight had gotten off the bay horse, and Federigo started toward it, through the packed horses of the other knights.

  Over his shoulder, he called, “I’ll see you sometime tomorrow, Durante.” Running up to the bay horse, he took the reins from the knight and judged the distance from the ground to the stirrup — it was a huge horse.

  “Let me help you mount, Your Grace,” the knight said.

  “Don’t bother.” Federigo leaped up, grabbed the pommel of the saddle, and stabbed his foot into the stirrup. With a lurch he swung his other leg over the high cantle of the saddle and sat upright, his feet dangling far above the stirrups. “Thank you.” He grinned down at the knight. Getting the reins firmly in his hands, he kicked the horse and let out a whoop that made the Legate’s mule rear up, snorting. The bay horse took off like an arrow, straight up the road. The knights yelled, and the boys screamed in delight. Looking back, Federigo saw that the Legate had fallen off his mule, and he laughed and steered the horse toward the gate of the palace, standing open in the bright mid-afternoon sun.

  *

  “And you got yourself all dirty again,” said Franciscus, who was Federigo’s tutor. “Can’t you ever remember that you are the King?”

  Federigo let the old man take off his shirt. “I think about it all the time. Why is the Legate here from Rome?”

  Franciscus bundled up the shirt in a ball and threw it onto a pile of laundry. “Ask my lord Diepold, he’ll tell you.” He rummaged through the closet for a clean shirt. Federigo sat down on the bed. He and Franciscus shared three rooms in the oldest, coldest part of the p
alace, far from everything else.

  “He won’t. He says I’m too young to worry about things like that and tells me to go play. I’m twelve, that’s old enough to know what happens in my Kingdom.” A little thread of doubt ran through his mind. “Isn’t it?”

  “Well,” Franciscus said, turning. He held up a clean shirt and inspected it in the fading light from the window. “You’re the oldest twelve-year-old I’ve ever seen. Do you suppose you can keep from ripping this one again? It’s almost past mending.”

  “I thought Elissa was going to make me more shirts.” Federigo rose and stood with his hands over his head so that Franciscus could put the shirt on.

  “She was, but Diepold wouldn’t give her the money for the cloth.”

  “I’ll see if I can get some.”

  Franciscus tugged the shirt straight and laced it up the front. “I’ve told you you mustn’t do that. The merchants who would give you something are all poor. The rich never give anything away, that’s how they get rich. And you mustn’t be a burden to the poor.”

  Federigo trotted to the window and leaned out to watch the sun go down. In the park below him, a few tame deer were grazing in the sweet grass of the meadow.

  “I could steal it.”

  He heard Franciscus move just in time to brace himself; the old man grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him vigorously.

  “Don’t you ever steal anything. Kings don’t steal, either.”

  “Kings steal all the time. They try to take each other’s Kingdoms, don’t they?” He let Franciscus shake him, because it made the old man feel that he was teaching him something. Franciscus was a very forceful tutor.

  “That’s not stealing,” Franciscus said. “That’s war.” His hand slipped from Federigo’s shoulder, and he sighed. “How can I teach you anything when everything you see teaches you precisely the opposite?”

  “You tell me what’s right, and they show me what’s wrong.”

  “I’m glad you know that.”

  Federigo said nothing. Before his eyes, the sunset spread rose and lilac over the sky, and the white stone towers of the city beyond the palace wall turned colors: minarets and church towers and the peaks of synagogues catching the last light of the sun. He had been King of Sicily since, he’d been three, just before his mother’s death. His father had died a year after he was born. In the nine years since his coronation, men like Diepold had fought each other to control the kingdom and make themselves rich; they’d kidnapped Federigo, because whoever held the King held the right to rule. Henry VII, Federigo’s father, had been the Emperor of the Germans; and if Henry had lived long enough, Federigo would have followed him to the Imperial throne, but now he was Diepold’s pawn. He watched the sun glide down behind the sea, and the sky darkened to a deep, beautiful purple-blue, picked out with the first stars. He had always known that orphans had no power to control their lives.

  “I’ll ask Diepold myself for money for new shirts,” he said. He knew it would get them nothing — Diepold didn’t much care what condition Federigo was in, so long as Diepold had him around to sign papers and appear at court receptions, like the one tonight.

  “You might ask him for kitchen money, too,” Franciscus said crisply. “You’re perfectly capable of feeding yourself, I know, but for an old man it’s not so easy to sneak into orchards and beg on street corners.”

  Federigo blushed and lowered his head. He’d forgotten that Franciscus had to eat as well. Usually he brought something back for the old man, but today the excitement of the procession had chased the thought from his head. “I teased the Papal Legate today and that made me forget. I’m sorry.”

  Gently, Franciscus said, “Don’t worry. Elissa sometimes brings me dishes from Diepold’s own table. I probably eat better than you do.” He went over to light a stub of candle on the wall.

  “Well, then,” Federigo said, grinning, “I’ll stop bringing you anything at all.” He swung around.

  Franciscus had gotten out the fancy coat, trimmed with shredded gold and embroidered with the arms of Sicily and Hohenstaufen.

  “I’m afraid this ceremony is going to go on all night. Have you studied your Latin?”

  “Amo, amas, amat. Yes.” Federigo helped him put the coat over his head and do up the jeweled clasps. “And I read all the German and nearly all the history.”

  “What about the mathematics?” Franciscus knelt stiffly to brush off the coat.

  “I did that, too.” Mathematics was his easiest subject; he never did his lessons beforehand, but figured out the problems in his head while Franciscus was checking up the answers on the last page of the text. There was a knock on the door.

  “Who is it?” Franciscus called, hastily standing up.

  The door opened, and Lothair, one of Diepold’s favorites, came into the room, swaying so that his gorgeous red robes sparkled in the candlelight.

  “Is the King ready?”

  Federigo went over to the table in the corner, where the little cherrywood chest with his ornaments stood. His coat was long enough that he didn’t have to wear shoes.

  “Just a moment.”

  Lothair always made him angry and watchful — Lothair hit him sometimes, when Diepold ordered him punished. Inside the chest lay all the jewels his mother had given him, the signet rings and chains and medals, and loose gems, blue sapphires, emeralds, rubies like drops of blood. The signet ring of the Kingdom of Sicily wasn’t there, Diepold had it and couldn’t rule without it. He took the big medal on its silver chain and hung it around his neck.

  “Now I’m ready.”

  “Come along, then,” Lothair said impatiently. “They’re all waiting.”

  Franciscus was staring at Lothair with a frown on his face. Federigo walked carefully, so that his bare feet wouldn’t show under the hem of the coat, and followed Lothair out the door.

  “The Papal Legate is named Giovanni da Capa,” Lothair said, walking fast and looking straight ahead. “In addition to the customary nobles and officers, Walter of Brienne is present in the court. He’s the tall—”

  “I know him,” Federigo said. He trotted to keep up. Walter of Brienne had been exiled a long time before, he couldn’t remember when, although he could visualize the man’s long horse face in his mind. Diepold had ordered him exiled, had wanted him killed, but now Walter was back. Something was going on, something he surely ought to know about but did not. In the small chamber outside the hall, he stopped and looked up at the arms of his House, hanging on the wall over the hearth. Lothair went off to talk to someone else. The room was packed with chairs and tables, at which secretaries sat writing and studying sheaves of documents. Other men, in velvet and satin and silk, stood or sat or wandered through the room, followed by pages. No one paid any attention to Federigo. He leaned against the stone wall between two tapestries and watched them carefully. What they did, these men — whom they decided to trust and whom to obey, whom to hate and fight — determined what would happen to him. Diepold couldn’t rule without them, the landholding barons and their servants; if he displeased them they would turn against him and make someone else Regent. I’m helpless, he thought, with a surge of anger. I can’t do anything except what they wish of me. He watched the Duke of Foligno, short, thin, balding, stop at a secretary’s desk and say something. When he turned away, his cold eyes grazed Federigo and didn’t stop; he looked at Federigo as if he didn’t exist. Federigo bit his lower lip.

  Diepold came in, surrounded by pages and soldiers. His coat was stiff with jewels and bits of precious metal, and on his huge, meaty hands rings flashed constantly. Federigo straightened up. Now the reception for the Legate would start. Diepold was German, like Federigo’s father, with whom he’d come to Sicily. His broad, heavy face always looked as if he were a little sick to his stomach. His skin was stretched so tightly over the bones of his face that it shone, and his mouth was permanently twisted into a sour grimace. Everybody else in the room turned and watched him. Some bowed — the minor nobl
es, who had to seek his favor. In the midst of it all, Diepold stopped and turned ponderously, looking around. When he saw Federigo leaning against the wall, he nodded, looked to a man beside him, and said, “You may tell the Legate the reception is about to begin. The King is here.”

  Federigo walked toward Diepold, circling around a clump of nobles and pages in the livery of Tommaso of Celano, the Count of Molise, who was so powerful he didn’t even have to come to major court events.

  Diepold looked grimly down at Federigo. The regent had been a knight once, of no rank and little influence, just a wandering knight; his thick bones and long, strong legs and hands looked out of place against his rich clothes and the jewels he wore, like a work horse in fancy harness.

  “Well, little King,” he said, “ready for the ordeal?” He clapped Federigo on the shoulder, almost affectionately. “Pay attention and do as I say, and everything will go well.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Trumpets blared. Two pages rushed up to Federigo. One straightened his coat and the other carried a velvet cushion with Federigo’s crown on it — a simple gold coronet, since the real crown was too heavy for any but a grown man to wear. Diepold reached out and took the crown. For a moment he held it, looking down at it. Federigo watched him expressionlessly. Diepold’s face tightened and grew fierce. Federigo clenched his fist against his side. Diepold had all the power to rule, but not the crown, and without the crown he would eventually lose his power. Someday Federigo himself would be old enough to rule. But if Diepold could only take the crown as well...

  “That’s mine.” Federigo thrust out his hands and took the gold circlet from Diepold.

  “So it is.” Diepold frowned at him. “Put it on so we can go in.”

  Brushing his long hair back, Federigo put the crown on his head. The trumpets blasted again, and in a little procession, with soldiers first and Federigo walking ahead of Diepold, they entered the great hall.

  Beneath the rows of pennants and the smoky, stinking torches, standing in a neat row on the rush-covered floor before the throne, the Papal Legate and his party waited. They bowed. Federigo walked up the stair to his throne, swung around, and drew a deep breath. Across the room a tall, thin man smiled and bowed within a ring of his own servants — Walter of Brienne. Federigo saw Diepold and Walter look at each other warily, like dogs circling before they fought.