***
King Theran unlatched the purple leaded glass sashes, swung them in and hooked them, filling the room with the evening calls of robins and purple martins, while Arianrhod seated Sir Pugh and Sir Bedward on either side of Theran's place at the head of the board. “I got us all here ahead of the kitchen, I see,” said Theran, taking his seat. “Smell the lilacs?”
“Yes indeed,” said Pugh with a nod.
“I don't believe I've been in this dining room,” said Bedward.
“You probably haven't,” said Theran. “I've always entertained in the big hall. This was always for eating with my two flaxen haired ladies.” He sprang from his chair and unhooked one of the sashes. “See the angel in the center of this pane? I finally found a glass blower and glazier good enough to put a likeness apiece in these two panes. I've scarcely been in here since Lira was taken from me.”
Pugh and Bedward waited in tongue-tied silence as Theran took his seat again.
“Just in time for the kitchen service,” said Arianrhod, taking a chair at the far end of the table.
In came two great platters of roast chickens, a long cutting board with six steaming loaves of brown bread, a bowl of white gravy and bowl after bowl of boiled peas picked at sunrise that very morning, making everyone forget all about lilacs. There was also honey, of course, along with lots of new cottage cheese. “And we've just got the pies in the oven,” said the last cook with a bow before turning away. “The very last of the cherries and the very first ripe peaches this year.”
“For my friends,” said Theran with a bow of his head, “heroes of this day for Bratin Brute. These are one eyed fowl, by the way.”
“How can they be with no heads?” said Pugh.
“They brought in a wagonload of coops from the first big farm inside Cyclopsia, this morning.”
“Well,” said Bedward, biting off strings of breast from between his thumb and the blade of his knife, “boss-eyed or one eyed, they're the best I've eat since I left here for Castlegoll.”
“So, my knights errant and hidden,” said Theran, daubing at the gravy running down his chin, “do you ones reckon that Spitemorta intends for to conquer her allies or is she going to let them share in her empire?”
“Mercy sire,” said Bedward, “She just wants hit all, every blooming acre and furlong of the entire continent. But beyond that, whether she lets the present monarchs rule over what was once their kingdoms in her name or whether she'll even let them hang on to their titles, no one knows.”
“Well,” said Pugh, “one hears that she might grant those who willingly join her empire to at least remain heads of state over what was once their kingdom. But that's merely a rumor.”
“I've been keeping a careful eye on that witch ever since she murdered her parents and crowned herself queen, and especially so from the moment I found out that she murdered Myrtlebell,” said Theran. “And I'd say that the rumors are probably right on the mark. If a king gives up and grovels at her feet all she wants, she'll give him the privilege of carrying out her will for her as long as he does nothing else. Now my problem is that I've gotten right testy in my old age...”
“We can see that, sire,” said Pugh. “We noticed right away.”
Theran threw back his head with a shout of laughter and slapped the table top. “Ye know, I let those witches push me around for a while, hoping to protect Myrtlebell,” he said, going serious again, “and they went and killed her anyway. So what's the point? I plan to stick her in her craw.” He knitted his brow as he peered under the table at something which squealed when he kicked it.
“Now please don't take me wrong, Your Majesty,” said Bedward, “but Bratin Brute is not a large realm and our army's...”
“Piddly,” said Theran, flinging the bones off his plate to two hounds who dashed after them from under the table, “just plain piddly. But look 'ee here Cefin, I wouldn't be much of a monarch if I got upset by the truth. Anyway, I've already seen what you're a-pointing out. Besides, I hired you and Pugh to point out the truth to me. And once you do, its my job to do the right thing with it.”
“Which is...?”
“Bratin Brute will fight to the very last man a-standing before falling to that witch!”
“Here, Here!” cried Pugh and Bedward, hiking their goblets of mead.
“Here...!” cried Theran, pausing to frown at his empty one as he grabbed up the big clay jug at his elbow and poured. “To Bratin Brute!” he cried, thrusting out his mead for a bumper.
“Besides,” he said, drawing his sleeve across his mouth as he sat down, “our armed might has increased recently. We've some right fierce new allies.”
“That's news, sire,” said Bedward. “So who are they?”
“Since you're going back to Goll, I'd undoubtedly put you at senseless risk by telling you. She is a witch, after all. For now,” he said, walking from goblet to goblet with his jug, “just appreciate that they have teeth.”
“I understand, Your Majesty.”
“Good,” he said, catching each of them by the eye. “And since you do, you'll both see that the knowledge of our new ally does not leave this room.” Satisfied with this, he ushered them out with an invitation to breakfast in the morning.
When Pugh and Bedward's echoes died away in the hall, Theran shuffled over to Arianrhod's goblet with his jug.
Arianrhod held up his hand to stop him
“You've been quiet all evening,” said Theran. “What's on your mind?”
“I've been listening. I was thinking about something the Beaks said when they were here.”
“And?”
“Poison darts. You know, to stop magic or something like that. Don't you remember? If they'd had any with them, they might have used them on Spitemorta and Demonica, right then and there.”
“Arianrhod! I do. I do. I'd forgot, but I remember now. You old shit! You may well have saved Bratin Brute.”
“Well perhaps. But don't forget that I'm still two year younger than you.”
“Well don't just sit there, Arianrhod. Fetch me that enchanted claw and slate which King Talorg gave us. I believe it's time to ask for the aid of our new ally.”
***
Brude Talorg, Ru of Marr, dressed only in his tattoos and smeared from head to toe with dark blue woad, paced back and forth in front of the stone settee on the balcony overlooking his twenty acre pear orchard. Sheep were being turned into the orchard, bleating and shaking out a hurried tinkling of bells as they raced with their half grown lambs to find the choicest grass under the trees. This settee was right where Myrtlebell was sitting when he proposed to her, only a few days before Spitemorta killed her. He looked up at the sound of the door.
“Majestic Ru,” said High Captain Girom as he stepped onto the balcony and bowed. “You sent for me, sire?”
Talorg gave a nod. “The first message from King Theran just appeared on the slate, Captain,” he said.
“He's asking for help?”
“Not quite the way I had expected he would.”
“It's the witches, isn't it?”
“You know what he wants us to send?”
“I...”
“He wants us to send a box of poison darts and the pipes to shoot them,” he said, keenly studying Girom's face.
“My word!” said Girom at a momentary loss for the words to go on, “Why, that would be... Why there's no way it could be Tramae or Donnel. It would have to be one of the captains as let it slip to Theran. But if I may say so sire, neither one would ever 'ave done it against the Kingdom of Marr, and it's not like Theran's an enemy. I'd stake my very life on the honor and loyalty of Drest and Erp.”
“You just did, Captain,” said Talorg, suddenly thrusting a grin into Girom's face. “I've always reckoned that you, Erp and Drest were my most loyal soldiers of all. If I were ever to trust my life to anyone, it would be to one of you. I certainly never dreamed that one of you would ever spill our centuries old secret at the first toast or slap on the back
you got outside Marr!” By now he was loud enough that a pair of field hands mowing beyond the orchard stopped swinging their scythes to look up.
“Of course not sire. What would you have me do?”
“Do?” roared Talorg. “Go find the one who threw away our secret and bring him here at this very time tomorrow. I want to see if his excuse is good enough to let him live! Go!”
Talorg's castle, Caisteal-Beak, was a rambling stone and timber affair atop an enormous man-made hill, rising from within a wooden stockade, laid out in a gigantic ellipse, ringed by a moat. Girom went out a back door of the castle and loped down the long stairway on the steepest side of the castle hill in such a state of distraction that he nearly tumbled and fell. “What am I to do?” he said on his way down. “Tamia might know. After all, she and Talorg are first cousins. I sure don't.” He scattered a dozen old hens as he tramped right through their puddle of slop on his way around the foot of the hill to his house, a large one room wattle and daub cottage with a smoke hole saddling the ridge pole of its thatched roof. The latch whang was out. He pulled it and pushed open the door.
Tamia was squatting by the coals in the fire pit, basting a shoat on a spit. “You're back already,” she said, rising at once at the sound of the door going shut. “Something's wrong, isn't there?”
Girom hadn't really thought about how to begin, though he gave her a hug at once.
“Something is very wrong,” she said, holding him at arms length to look him over with her chestnut eyes in a face of blue tattoos and raven black hair.
“I don't know what I've stepped into,” he said, giving her another squeeze and turning quickly away to begin pacing. “Oh yes I do. I don't have any idea under the eye of Fioreun what to do about it. That's what.”
“What happened?” she said. “I've got to turn the spit and move the bread while you tell me. Go on.”
“How awful to only be able to look down on her from above and not be able to touch her until her soul is free,” he thought with a panicky swallow.
“Go on,” she said.
“Do you know about the blowgun darts and the poison which kills magic?”
“That sounds strange...”
“Well the poison salve was able to stop dead the magic of both Demonica and Queen Spitemorta when we had them in the dungeon. And the reason you don't know about it is because he who tells about it, forfeits his life. You remember that when we were at Bratin Hall with King Theran, the two witches showed up. Well, I had no better sense than to ask Drest and Erp, right in front of Theran and everybody, if either of them had some of the darts. It's the most outrageously stupid thing I ever did in my life...”
Tamia set aside her bowl and brush and was on her feet at once, gently taking his hand.
“So last night,” he said, heaving a sigh, “King Theran sent Talorg his first emergency message with the enchanted slates, asking for a mess of poison darts. Well, Talorg started roaring at me about it, just before I came downstairs. And it took me so much by surprise that I didn't remember at first my saying anything at all about the darts at Bratin Hall. So I honestly let on that I had no idea who would do such a thing. And he's sent me out, charged with finding the one who spilt the beans. And he intends to roast him in a wicker man unless he has one bloomin' good reason...”
“Well why?”
“It's a secret law. I mean the darts are secret...”
“Oh,” she said as she slowly sat on a three legged chair and stared out across the coals, “and Talorg can't be crossed, and is also rigid as a brand new stump over every single law that ever was.”
“I'm dead, aren't I?”
“You'd better not be!” she said with sudden fury. “If that idiot cousin of mine harms you, I'm going to kill him and roast his tiny heart on that there spit and stretch his narrow minded hide on the wall outside and put my best embroidered pillow on the seat of his coronary chair and be queen of the Beaks! I may have promised to quit being a warrior, but I'm in line to be queen the minute I cut his throat.”
“Well outside of that, what are we going to do?”
“Why don't we find Tramae and Donnel?”
“What?” said Girom. “Why?”
“They were there,” she said, giving him a quick hug before starting to pace the room. “Didn't they go with you?”
“But what does that have to do with what I did?”
“You need me to help figure out what to do. And I know Tramae. Let's go see what she says.”
“Why don't you find Tramae and Donnel and bring them back here while I get Drest and Erp? Talorg undoubtedly expects me to pull them off duty right away.”
Girom found Drest and Erp in the armory in short order. He had scarcely returned with them, when Tamia came through the door with Tramae and Donnel. “Why you each have new tattoos on your faces,” he said as he scurried about, finding chairs.
“We left Bratin Brute knowing that Father Theran would soon be in peril,” said Tramae with a bob of a curtsey as she sat. “Donnel and I led Myrtlebell to her death. As a matter of honor we want to help my half sister's dear father defeat the witch who killed her, so we've taken up arms and we need to bear the images of our protectors into any combat against her.”
“I certainly understand,” said Girom, “though seeing you chose to become a warrior would be a shock, Tramae.”
“I found them practicing at the butts,” said Tamia. “I'd say she's already chosen.”
“I see the bows,” he said.
“This is Loach naCait Dia,” said Tramae, gathering back her hair as she turned her newly tattooed cheek toward him, “warrior cat god, my protector. And look at Laidir Borb Mathan on Donnel, his strong fierce bear protector.”
Donnel was out of his chair at once, holding forth his cheek for each person in the room.
“They're splendid,” said Girom.
“So why have you ones brought us here?” said Tramae as she took her seat. “Does this have something to do with Fa?”
Girom drew a deep breath and glanced at Tamia.
“I saw that,” said Tramae. “It is Fa. He's being impossibly bull headed, isn't he? What's this all about?”
Girom launched into a complete recounting of everything that had happened, pacing about the room, flinging his arms, including a begging of forgiveness from everyone for his thick headed forgetting in front of Talorg that he was the very one who had let Theran know about the poison darts. He felt that he had lost his hold on every last shred of his dignity by the time that he sat down, though he saw nothing but sympathy in the eyes of each person in the room.
Tramae stood up at once, the very picture of poised determination. “I know exactly what to do,” she said, giving Girom's hand a quick squeeze as she began a scholarly pacing about. “Fa might burn any one of you in a wicker man. Or all of you if he's really furious. But he will not burn me.” She saw squirming right away and paused to hold up her hand. “Fa sends us to King Talorg to make an alliance at the same time that we discover that he is part of our blood. How could discussing those darts by any one of us ever be regarded as treason? Fa will indeed come to his senses, but only after I show him where he's mislaid them. We all need to see him at the same time. Has a time been set?”
“Right after breakfast, when they turn his sheep out to pasture,” said Girom. “On the balcony.”
“Then we shall see him together,” she declared as Tamia grabbed her into a long and tearful hug.
****
Tramae and Donnel quietly ate supper, sitting on either side of Talorg. He said nothing to them about any sort of problem, but he was obviously in a positively morose mood. Donnel finished up and excused himself. Tramae nearly choked, hurrying down her last mouthful. Out in the hallway, she saw him disappear around a corner at the other end. She ran after him, hiking the skirts of her snow white leine. “Hey!” she cried in a hushed whisper, pounding the floor stones with her bare feet as she rounded the next corner. “Wait, Dodo!”
“Wh
at's up?” he said, waiting for her to catch up.
“Pack your things quickly,” she said. “We've got to move.”
“What?”
“We've got to get out of here, now. Can we get our unicorns out of the stable without anyone noticing?”
“Wait a minute. What are we doing?”
“We're going to Bratin Brute,” she said. “And we don't want a single soul knowing about it until after they turn Fa's sheep into the orchard, tomorrow morning.”
****
“Well here we are, an hour before supper,” said Arianrhod. “You did send for me, aye sire?”
“Yeap,” said Theran, handing him the slate. “What do you make of this?”
“Is it a reply?”
“Read it.”
“Aloud?”
“Suit yourself.”
“Well, let's see. It says: 'Theran, Ally, Friend and King of Bratin Brute:
I cannot grant your exact request. The darts are best forgotten for your sake and for ours. I have another sort of assistance on its way. Brude Talorg'“ He handed back the slate and took a seat at the board.
“So,” said Theran. “Do you sense a threat implied in, 'best forgotten for your sake and ours,' or is he keeping us out of harm's way?”
“Well, he obviously knows something that we don't. It could well be a threat, I suppose, but why would he ever make threats and send aid at the same time? Are you going to write back and ask him?”
Theran gave a sigh. “If I do, I'm jolly well going to scratch my head first. It may be wisest to see what he shows us, first. What if it were an accident that we know about the darts at all? Could any of our visitors be in trouble for this? I want no one jeopardized or offended by anything we say. We need this alliance if we have a prayer at all. Either way, I'll die before submitting to orders from the very witches who murdered my darling little girl.”
Chapter 156
Herio, Sergeant Philpott and the sparrows and Pebbles with six of her brood of young crows had spent nearly the entire morning traveling through a birch forest whose unblemished white and black trunks shot up a good eighty feet before branching out into a canopy of leaves, rattling in the breeze like rain far overhead. With the sun almost directly above, the white trunks had grown nearly bright enough to dazzle the party riding endlessly between them. Presently a dark line appeared through the trees ahead, and in short order the birch gave way to a thicket of aspens flanking a fast cold stream. “See the peaks beyond the tops of those spruce trees, yonder?” said Philpott as the unicorns dropped their muzzles to the water for a long drink. “That's two huge craters right together.”
Heart of the Staff - Complete Series Page 167
