Rider of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “No, it’s not beneath me. In fact, it might be beyond me.” She finished with the last button and Elspeth started rooting around for a pair of shoes that would fit. It seemed most of them were too large. Imogen said, “So your brother Jeffrey, he’s the King of Tremontane? I thought the King was named Anthony.”

  “That was our father. He died three years ago, very suddenly, just after our oldest brother Sylvester adopted out of the family and made Jeffrey the heir.”

  “I don’t understand what ‘adopted out’ means.”

  Elspeth held up a pair of shoes, examined them critically, then tossed them aside. “In Tremontane, when you get married, you make oath to your spouse’s family, or he makes oath to yours, and that’s being adopted. Pass me that shoe, please? Sylvester’s wife is Baroness of Silverfield, and she would have had to give that up to adopt into the North line, so Sylvester gave up his bond to our family instead. It was a surprise, really. Oh, these fit well, don’t you think?”

  “They look comfortable.” Elspeth looked just like a life-sized doll, slender and short with those tiny feet. Imogen felt a pang of jealousy. She was comfortable with her body, liked how curvy and plump she was, but looking at Elspeth North made her wonder what it would be like to be small and dainty and helpless and have people clamoring to take care of her. Then she thought of how Elspeth acted younger than her years, and how fragile she seemed, and wondered if Elspeth behaved the way she did because she’d been treated like a doll all her life. Why would Imogen want other people to take care of her when she was clearly capable of taking care of herself? She thought of Victory, and her tiermatha, and the jealousy melted away.

  “Who was that young man standing by the fireplace?” Elspeth asked, pulling on a soft-sided pair of boots.

  “Hesketh. Hrovald’s son by his second marriage.” Imogen thought about commenting on the young man’s personality, or lack thereof, but decided that would be catty. Time enough for Elspeth to figure it out herself.

  “Are you his third wife, then?”

  “Fourth. His first wife divorced him, which might account for his attitude toward all women. His second wife died giving birth to Hesketh. His third wife died of lung fever about four years ago. And now there’s me.”

  “But you aren’t…you don’t….” Elspeth stammered to a halt. Imogen, puzzled, looked at her blushing face and figured it out.

  “No, didn’t I say? The banrach is a marriage…not exactly in name only, but a marriage of spirit and not of the flesh. I can’t even imagine having sex with Hrovald.” She shuddered. “I’ve never met his mistress, but I know he has one, so he enjoys sex, but I don’t think he likes women except in their proper place, which is either in his bed or out of his sight.”

  Elspeth’s blush had intensified. “So you’ve never…made love with him….”

  “No. Not with anyone, actually. I’ve never found the right partner. And I’m a little superstitious about birth control—one mistake and say goodbye to your tiermatha for two years.”

  “You don’t—I mean, the Kirkellan don’t wait for marriage?”

  “Not really. Though we don’t have sex with anyone we wouldn’t want to have children with, just in case. Why, is that a custom of your people?”

  Elspeth nodded. She was so red Imogen started to worry about her. What a strange country Tremontane was, to make sex both a mystery and an embarrassment. Or maybe it was just girl-woman Elspeth’s reaction. “It strengthens the marriage bond if you wait to make love until after it’s formed,” Elspeth said.

  “I don’t understand what a marriage bond is.”

  “It’s when you swear oath to your husband or wife and the lines of power bind the oath. It’s like an extension of the bonds that tie our families together.”

  “We don’t have anything like that. Neither do the Ruskalder.”

  “There are more lines of power in Tremontane than anywhere else. It’s like when you wrap yarn into a ball, right? The strands are closest together at the top and bottom and spread out wider everywhere else. That’s the example my history professor used, anyway. She said the more lines of power, the stronger the influence they have on earth, and the better able they are to bind people together. I don’t know how to explain it better than that.”

  Imogen had never heard of anything like that. She knew what lines of power were, that they tied heaven to earth and, according to Anneke’s Deviser, provided the magical energy that powered all Devices, but that they might affect the oaths people swore…? She had an image of the banrach bound not by her oath or Hrovald’s, but by heaven’s presence. Would that even be breakable? This was definitely not a conversation she’d pictured having with the Crown Princess of Tremontane, not that she’d pictured having any kind of conversation with the Crown Princess of Tremontane, ever.

  “Take whichever clothes you want,” she said, derailing the conversation so Elspeth’s color could return to its usual pink-and-white, “and Anneke will dispose of the rest. Then I think you should come to meet Victory.”

  Victory liked Elspeth as much as she did Anneke, which either said something for the horse’s perceptiveness or said Victory would like anyone who fed her raw vegetables between meals. “I’ve never seen a horse as big as her before,” Elspeth breathed, her eyes shining. “I have a horse at home, but he’s nothing special. I mostly ride him in the Park. Jeffrey doesn’t really care for horses.”

  “I’ll take you for a ride in a day or so, after the next storm blows over,” Imogen said, rating the King of Tremontane down a few notches. “And—oh, Saevonna, come and meet Elspeth North.”

  Saevonna was leading Lodestone past the stables, followed by three others of the tiermatha, but turned aside to join Imogen. “Elspeth, this is Saevonna, a member of my—I mean, Hrovald’s tiermatha. That’s a Kirkellan warband, very highly trained and deadly in combat. And that’s Jathan, Lorcun, and Maeva. There are eight others, wandering around—where is everyone, Saevonna?”

  “Kalain, Revalan and Aden went into town looking for entertainment. And before you say anything, yes, Dorenna told them to behave themselves or you’d make ’em dance naked in the snow. The others are still at the practice yard. It was a good day, Imogen. Nobody tried to start a fight and we had some practice bouts with some of the Ruskalder. Things might be looking up.”

  “I’m not getting my hopes up too high, but that does sound promising.”

  “I’m not going to get excited until one of those men is willing to fight me. So we may have a year or so to go.” Saevonna rolled her eyes. “I have to take care of Lodestone now. She hasn’t been feeling well and I feel bad making her haul me around. A pleasure to meet you, miss.”

  “She didn’t know who I am,” Elspeth said in a low voice as they left the stables.

  “You’ll find a lot of people here don’t know the North name,” Imogen said. “I don’t know how you feel about that.”

  Elspeth considered. “I think I’d like to be unknown for a while,” she said finally. “It feels safer to be anonymous. To not be someone whose name makes her a pawn. I hate being a pawn.”

  Imogen privately thought Elspeth’s surname was like a shield, but she couldn’t argue with the girl’s logic. “You can join me and my ladies in the morning, if you want,” she said. “It’s boring, but it’s not as boring as staring south out your window wishing you could fly.” Elspeth blushed again. No wonder she seemed younger than she was, if she blushed at absolutely everything. “And—” Imogen was struck with an idea. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to teach me your language? I’m probably not as quick a study as you are, but it would give us both something to do and I wouldn’t mind having the skill.”

  Elspeth’s blush faded, and she smiled. “I’d enjoy that,” she said.

  Elspeth turned out to be a charming companion. Imogen’s ladies-in-waiting were nice but subservient, Anneke was a good friend but lacked the common experience that would make them truly close, and she hardly ever saw the women of the ti
ermatha. Elspeth, on the other hand, was, despite their cultural differences, of the same rank as Imogen, which gave them things in common Imogen had never had with anyone before. Elspeth was endlessly patient with Imogen’s struggles with Tremontanese; Imogen, for her part, found she could keep up with Elspeth’s discussions of politics more easily than she’d believed. It seemed her mother’s tutelage hadn’t been wasted. Between her lessons with Elspeth, her needlework, and her rides on Victory, Imogen found the short winter days passed quickly.

  “I am to make—no, making—a scarf for I—damn—me,” Imogen said, waving a length of knitting at Elspeth. “Only it’s terrible and it looks more like a noose than a scarf,” she added, reverting to Ruskeldin.

  “Your Tremontanese is much better, though.” Elspeth stuck her knitting needles into her ball of wool and stretched. “Agneta, is it time for a rest?”

  Imogen’s lady-in-waiting shook her head. “Your Highness should show more diligence. How will you care for your family’s needs if you cannot master the wifely arts?”

  “I’ll pay someone to knit for me,” Elspeth said grouchily.

  “The Kirkellan don’t knit,” Imogen added. She laid down her knitting and sighed. “I am tired of the knitting,” she said in Tremontanese. “I wish to do the—what’s the word for embroidery, Elspeth?”

  “We say needlework,” Elspeth said. “And that bores me too. My mother tried to make me a needlewoman and I just couldn’t sit still for it.”

  “I like the needlework,” Imogen said, reverting to Elspeth’s language. “It is…um…peaceful. We listen—no, hear much with the hoop in the hand.”

  “Now if you can just learn to drop your articles, you’ll be most of the way to fluency.”

  “Then I will speak the three languages. Damn. Three languages. I don’t suppose you’d teach me to swear in Tremontanese?”

  “I don’t know any swear words.”

  “I don’t believe you.”

  “Well, I’m going to pretend I don’t, anyway. Agneta, please tell me it’s dinner time?”

  Chapter Seven

  One morning near the end of the year Imogen was startled to find Hrovald at the breakfast table before her. “Sit,” he ordered, not looking up from his meal. Imogen sat, and told herself she’d been planning to do that anyway. “The Samnal starts in less than a week, so you’d better start readying the rooms for our guests.”

  Imogen felt the dizziness Hrovald’s statements usually left her with. “What’s a samnal?”

  Now he did look at her, eyebrows furrowed. “Mean to say you’re the daughter of a chief and you don’t know anything about your enemies? The Samnal is when all the chiefs come to this house to talk business and pretend they don’t want me to choke on a chicken bone and die. It’s your job to play hostess. Start figuring out where you’re going to put everyone and what you’re going to feed them. They’re here for five days. It should be five days that remind them of why I’m the King, understand?”

  “I understand. I’ll be ready.”

  “Good. Eat up. Don’t bother with that swill, it’s gone off. Call for a new cask.” Hrovald shoved his mostly empty trencher aside and stood. “Find something for Hesketh to do. I don’t want him moping in a corner. Makes the chiefs think I’m weak, with an heir like him. I don’t suppose you’d be interested in bearing me another one?” He roared at his unfunny joke, and Imogen managed a smile that lasted until he left the room. Then she buried her face in her hands and sighed deeply. Host the Samnal. She had no idea what that meant. Fortunately, she knew who did.

  She’d sought out Inger, the chatelaine of the King’s house, the first week she was there. She didn’t know what a chatelaine was, but from Anneke’s explanation, she learned Inger was the one who ran the house and knew where everything was. That sounded like a good person to have on her side. Inger, for her part, had been standoffish until she realized the new Queen didn’t want to interfere with her work, and it didn’t take long after that for them to become friends.

  “Already working on it,” Inger told her later that morning. “The oxen are coming for the slaughter, we’ve broken open the stores of ale, and a team of men are out clearing the grounds for the camps. The chiefs all bring an honor guard,” she explained when Imogen looked puzzled, “but they have to camp outside the walls because we don’t have room for them, and since the chiefs all stay at the King’s house they aren’t much of a guard, see?” She snorted and waved away a man who wanted her attention. “Part of Hrovald’s plan to remind everyone who’s King around here, not like they’d be forgetting that with his army just around the corner.”

  Imogen nodded. Inger was a tall, heavyset woman with red hair pulled back tightly from her face. She wore a ring of keys jangling at her waist that she played with when she was at rest, as she was now. Her long fingers clinked the keys together, one at a time. “Does Hrovald really need to intimidate his…subordinates all the time?” Imogen asked.

  Inger shrugged. Clink. “Came to power through treachery, probably fears he’ll go the same way,” she said in a lowered voice after looking around to see no one was close enough to hear. “Or maybe he just likes having power over people. I notice he never calls you by your name when he can say ‘wife’ instead, like he owns you.”

  Imogen had noticed this as well. “So what am I responsible for, during this Samnal?”

  Clink clink clink. “Playing the hostess during meals and the entertainments. Making sure the chiefs’ needs are met—you just bring their requests to me, if it’s something you can’t do. Handing out prizes for the competitions. I wish we still had these in summer. So much easier to host…we could have the entertainments in the courtyard instead of the skorstala, and the competitions are fiercer.”

  “Why isn’t it held in summer?”

  Inger scowled. “To show everyone if Hrovald wants a thing, they all have to jump to make it happen.” She rattled her keys once more. “You should probably spend more time back here while we’re preparing, give you an idea of what to expect. And I’d warn those Kirkellan warriors not to be drawn into the competitions. Bad enough losing without losing to a foreigner.”

  Imogen’s days now became much busier, leaving her little time to ride and even less to visit with her friends, though she did pass Inger’s advice along. She learned a great deal about how the King’s house was run, enough that when the first runners came from the gate shouting that the chiefs had come, she felt confident she could give the impression she was Queen in fact as well as name.

  She stood beside Hrovald on the steps to the main house, shivering in the cold breeze that swept eddies of snowflakes across the frozen ground. Hrovald didn’t seem disturbed by the cold. He wore a finely stitched shirt and unstained leather jerkin, and his boots looked expensive and not of Ruskalder or Kirkellan make. In front of them the tiermatha, dressed in their finest Kirkellan armor, was drawn up in two rows, standing at attention like a colonnade of statues and looking fierce and foreign. Hrovald had tried to exclude the women from the formation, but the entire group had gone stony and Hrovald had backed down. Imogen thought he might have been intimidated and felt a moment’s pride in her tiermatha. At least someone was allowed to stand up to him.

  They watched the gate swing open and a double column of warriors march through, followed by a man on a Kirkellan horse of very high quality. So Hrovald had shared out his goodwill gift with his underlings. An excellent ploy for keeping them satisfied.

  This man, however, didn’t look satisfied. His full beard obscured most of his features, but his eyes were stern and his heavy eyebrows furrowed over a beaky nose. He wore thick furs over a rigid leather jerkin and his gloved hands held the reins as if he were prepared to pull his horse around at the least provocation. “Hrovald,” he said neutrally, and saluted him.

  “Ingivar,” Hrovald said with a smile and a salute. “Welcome to my house.”

  “Your house is far more welcoming than it was last year,” Ingivar said, bowing to Imo
gen. “We are all pleased to have a Queen again. I give you good morning, your Majesty.”

  “I give you good morning, Ingivar,” Imogen replied. “Be welcome.”

  “See to the disposition of troops and return here,” Hrovald said, “and we will tell great lies of battle.” He smiled again. Ingivar didn’t. He saluted his King again and wheeled his horse around. Imogen wondered how Hrovald dared order that man around, with his hard, stern eyes and commanding presence. Ingivar didn’t look like the kind of man used to taking orders, and Imogen felt cold thinking of how ruthless Hrovald had to be to keep his chiefs in line.

  They repeated the ceremony of greeting seven more times throughout the day. None of the other chiefs were as formidable as Ingivar. Knoten of Hvartfast did everything except lick Hrovald’s boots; Olof of Sjoven was a huge man who didn’t seem terribly bright; Jannik of Hjolden stared at the tiermatha as if he expected some treachery on their part. The tiermatha continued to fill their ceremonial duties without complaint, though when Imogen caught Saevonna’s eye the woman wrinkled her nose in momentary contempt. They did not appreciate being treated as Hrovald’s toys, his reminder to the chiefs that he was powerful enough to have a tiermatha of the Kirkellan at his command. They were even less happy when he ordered them to stand an honor guard in the skorstala at supper that evening, watching Hrovald and the chiefs and the officers eat without having been given food themselves. They were too well disciplined to show annoyance, but Imogen was angry on their behalf.

  When the meal was finished, she watched them file out in the direction of the kitchen and longed to go after them and complain together, but Hrovald put his hand on her shoulder when she would have risen and forced her into her seat. “Not quite yet, wife,” he said in a low voice, then stood and smiled a smug, possessive smile. The room went silent.

  “Welcome to the Samnal! Welcome to my house! This is a time of celebration, a time to bid the old year goodbye and welcome in the new. Welcome to my wife, Imogen of the Kirkellan, and to our honored guest, Princess Elspeth North of Tremontane.” A murmur went up at that, and to Imogen’s right Elspeth tensed at being the focus of so much attention. “You’ll show them the respect due their stations. Now! Tomorrow is for talking. Tonight is for drinking!”