Elfling (U.S. Edition)

by Corinna Turner

  I touched the ring at my waist. I could not give up. I would not. Whether the Duke of Albany was my father or not, my mother had said he would take care of me. So long as I had that precious ring as proof of my blood, I would keep trying.

  Raven’s tiny forepaw touched my hand gently, as though in support of my decision, and I smiled slightly. I did not think my strange pet relished the thought of lifelong urchinhood any more than I did.

  Anyway, I had reached the Charing Crosse, and the Courte Gate was visible ahead. I darted under the shelter of a nearby stall. The gossips I sought were closeted under there, drinking wine with the off-duty palace servants. I slipped into a seat beside a graying man who sat alone.

  He peered at me short-sightedly. “Is that young Serapion? I’ll wager so. It’s been a quiet week, you know. But I do like a boy who takes interest in important matters.”

  Actually, he liked anyone who would sit and listen to him, and I had often restrained myself from observing out loud that most of the things he recounted were not remotely ‘important’.

  But my source was already continuing willingly, “Rumors of the Marquise de la Salde’s fat belly are continuing, more substantiated now. But that’s the Frenchy’s problem. Ah, yes, Duke Collingwood’s horse, what was its name...?”

  I partially tuned out as the flow continued. Trivial, and to my mind, deadly boring, incidents slipped through my mind unimpeded. Old Roberto, or Robert, as I had no doubt he had been christened, fancied himself as something of an orator and always kept the juiciest things till last. Or perhaps he had learned it was the only way to keep his audience.

  Finally, knowing he was drawing to a close, my mind drifted back to the cloak problem.

  “...No, the only real event of any note this week is the return of the Duke of Albany from the continent…”

  What! Did he just say…?

  “…Been away for years, travelling,” Old Roberto went on, obliviously. “Not that he is the Duke of Albany, apparently, they just call him that, seeing as he’s a Duke, and his name’s Alban. Witty, like. I don’t know what he’s actually Duke of. No, but he came to court just today; it’s only politeness to greet Her Majesty when you’re a Duke and all, and gone so long. A minor to-do, though. He’s not what you’d call a prominent player at court...”

  My head spun. After so long, I realized I’d actually stopped believing I would ever find the man. My weekly visit was more a refusal to succumb to my fate than a real hope. How I swallowed down my pounding heart enough to speak casually I did not know. “Is he away again already, or still at court?”

  Old Roberto looked startled, unused to questions from this particular audience. “Nay, to be sure, he is still within. His coach bears his coat of arms; I have not seen it pass.”

  “Oh, what is it?” I asked, all innocence. “Coats of arms are fascinating, I think. I never know how they don’t run out of designs.”

  Old Roberto blinked at this interest, but I knew he loved nothing so well as to memorize coats of arms, and he was always more than willing to keep his audience a little longer. “‘Tis a black bird, wings all a’spread, an eagle, I’d say, most coats of arms carry that bird. It holds crossed sticks in its claws, and sits thus upon a background of gold.”

  I wondered how one reminded one’s heart to beat. I thanked Roberto in my usual manner and left, but I did not go far. I took up a station under the eaves, in an alley off the street with a clear view of the Courte Gate, the main entrance to the Palace of Whitehall. I glanced around, and when as certain as I could be that I was unobserved, I lifted my shirt a little to peep at the ring. There it was, as clear as in my memory, that little black bird, wings outspread, and the two straight sticks in its claws, crossed.

  Raven poked her head from under the shirt, tilted up her face and cried out softly. This was her true voice, I had learned. It was rich and mellow, and not at all kittenish, but somehow equally appealing. I pushed her back out of sight with a gentle hand, hiding the ring away again. My eyes went back to the gates. Within those towering walls was the man who might be my father. Never mind father, who might look after me! Sooner or later, he would come out. I wrapped the blanket more closely around myself and leant against the wall to wait.

  ~+~

  CHAPTER 5

  LOVERS’ RINGS

  The rain carried on, driving sideways with frequent fickle changes of direction, so that whichever side of the alley I stood, I found little protection under the eaves. Eventually I gave up and stood, blanket gathered around me, rain dripping from ears and nose. Soon the icy bite of the water against my skin had me stirring uneasily. Even though it was early in the season, to get wet through could be terribly dangerous.

  Almost, I abandoned my post to seek somewhere drier, but the wine stall was too conspicuous—people would grow suspicious of my watch—and to go elsewhere was to abandon my last hope. I gritted my teeth with rather savage abandon. What did it matter? I could stand here worrying about a fatal chill on the morrow, only to be knifed or run down on my way back this very night.

  My fingers clenched as I realized I was assuming this would come to nothing. After so long, real hope was hard to muster. I probably would not even get to speak to the Duke, safe as he was behind his urchin-proof wall of servants. Still, if I did not at least give it my best attempt, I might just die of despair.

  It was late afternoon by the time the gates rumbled open for what must have been the fiftieth time. I did no more than raise my head; the long day had left me drained from disappointment as well as cold. My back straightened with a jerk almost of its own volition when I saw the black bird of the crest on each of the lead horses’ breastplates. I looked again. Breastplates? And face guards and mail, too, while the coachman’s seat was shielded on both sides. Strong shutters, just now wide open, could close the glassless windows of the coach to narrow defensive slits.

  I paused, numb with astonishment. Not primarily because of the coach’s heavy defenses, but more for it being, finally, the right coach. Then Old Roberto’s comments about the Duke being just returned from the continent filtered into my mind. Travel on the continent was chancy at best, I knew, and clearly he was so newly returned that the coach had not yet been de-rigged of its defensive fitments. At least the shutters were open.

  All the same, I hesitated, my heart lurching around in my throat in an appallingly uncomfortable manner. Now, at the very moment, I quailed. What if I could not speak to him? What if he sent me packing? Then I would have no hope at all, and I wasn’t sure I could bear it. It didn’t have to be now, I could come back tomorrow, wait again...

  And if he never comes again? I asked myself scornfully. How will you survive that? Common sense, and will, overcame fear before the coach passed me. It was going slow, the horses at a mere trot, but the lead pair had just been put into a canter, and I saw the second pair’s muscles bunch to follow. I ran forward in a desperate burst of speed, I gripped the doorframe, hand passing easily through the glassless window, and I leapt, feet landing safe on the step.

  I heard the footman’s oath, and the next moment the coachman peered back at me, yelling, probably for me to get off, but I scarcely heard. The whip snapped through the air beside me, and I felt a momentary flicker of hope. Most coachmen would have laid it across my back... I crushed this ridiculous notion immediately. An unusually kind-hearted servant was no reflection on the master.

  Tightening my grip on the doorframe, I pulled myself up and looked into the coach, thrusting the curtain aside.

  A pair of piercing green eyes arrested me, gleaming back from the dimness of the coach’s interior. The Duke was lowering his arms. He held a clip in one hand and his hair, black as the bird on his crest, fell around his face. Clearly he had clipped it back in the current fashion out of respect for the Queen. I was already summing up what I saw. My uncanny knack for accurate readings of people on first sight had largely contributed to my early survival on the street, albeit with some near misses.

&nbs
p; I saw a man dressed in dark green velvet trimmed with black. He looked close to forty, but might’ve been a little younger, and he was lean and powerful in build. His nose was rather large and very sharp, and he had a firm chin. His only jewelry was a small gold cross and a ring that looked the twin of my own. He was clearly a powerful man, and also a wealthy man, but he did not flaunt it. Despite the velvet, the cut of his clothes was more practical than fashionable, his ruff on the small side, which fitted with the sword that lay beside him.

  I sensed he would make a bad enemy, but I did not fear him on sight. I was still staring at him when he spoke. He seemed unalarmed by my sudden appearance and did not hasten to call down curses on his servants for allowing me to get so far. Instead, he said firmly, “If you want alms, apply at the back door of my house.”

  I did not move. I was having difficulty unsticking my tongue and felt equally unsure what to say with it.

  The hard eyes softened by a degree. “If I give you so much as a penny, you know, I shall never be able to drive the length of the city again.” There was a definite flicker of humor in that. “I should be mobbed,” he added, for clearly my expression showed no trace of understanding and he thought I did not comprehend what he meant. On the contrary, I knew that for a noble to give alms from their carriage was to curtail all future speed through the city, hence why most coachmen would whip beggars away ruthlessly.

  When I still didn’t move to let go, the humor in the Duke’s eyes faded and fear unlocked my tongue. “Please, my lord, I must speak with you.”

  For a moment I thought he would still dismiss me, but then his eyes ran over my face with a look of sudden intentness. “Very well, lass.” His hand closed on the collar of my jerkin, and in a few seconds I found myself on the seat opposite him.

  I gaped at him. He had actually deposited my dripping, reeking self on his upholstery! Then the true import of his words hit me. He knew I was a girl. His depth of perception was frightening. I always knew if a fellow urchin was male or female, but since others clearly did not, I’d always assumed it was…one of those unique talents of mine best not discussed. Maybe…maybe this really was my father.

  The Duke sat back on his own seat, tucking his clip safely in a pocket and eyeing my evident terror with amused benevolence. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he remarked. “And may I remind you that it was you who jumped aboard wanting to speak to me.”

  Aboard, yes, but not quite this aboard. I tore my eyes from the man long enough to take in the coach interior. A longbow and a crossbow hung on one wall, and a heavy shield on the other. Arrows and crossbow bolts stuck from an open-ended box. Just returned from Europe indeed. I looked back at the Duke.

  At my continued silence his expression became very firm. His patience had been far beyond what I could possibly have expected but apparently there were limits to his forbearance. “I don’t eat urchins, and I am as much flesh and blood as you are. Now what do you want?”

  I had to speak, and I knew it. I had to speak now, or he would put me from his carriage and it would be over. My chance gone, perhaps forever. But after so many years of solitude and silence, I could not frame what I wanted to say.

  Groping at my waist, I felt a second of pure panic as the string came loose, then tiny sharp claws pressed cool gold into my hand. I took the ring from Raven, willing my heart back down into my chest and giving Raven a little push to remind her to stay out of sight. I tried once more to find words, but they would not come, so finally I simply held the ring out towards the Duke, crest forwards.

  The Duke opened his mouth as if to make some tolerant enquiry, but in the same moment his eyes narrowed and he reached out slowly towards the ring, his face suddenly expressionless. Uncertain and racked with suspense, I allowed him to take it from my numb fingers. He turned it slowly in his hands, finally tilting it towards the window so he could read the inscription inside the band.

  It was, I knew, a romantic inscription in Latin. Or half of one. A commonly known metaphor on courting birds. ‘You shall build my nest, and I shall fill it,’ it ran, but my mother’s ring had only the part about filling it. I eyed the Duke’s ring in speculation. It seemed a curiously domestic inscription for lovers’ rings, but all this romantic stuff left me rather cold anyway.

  “Where did you get this?” the Duke managed at last, his voice changed to a whisper. The eyes that stared back at me were haunted now.

  I swallowed hard and had to try twice to find my voice. “My mother gave it to me,” I said haltingly, but gaining confidence, continued, “when she was dying. She said...she said to take it to the Duke of Albany and that...that he would...look after me.”

  He went on looking at me, his mouth curved in a hard line, while hope, pain and confusion mingled in his narrowed eyes. “And...who was your mother?”

  “Lady Isabel Ravena,” I said promptly and proudly, my chin rising in defiance of my ragged state.

  The Duke closed his eyes for a second with a tiny sigh. Then his eyes fixed me to the spot again. “She sent you to me?” he murmured, but I felt sure he was not expecting an answer to that and remained silent. “You’re her daughter?”

  “Yes, as I said,” I replied, my chin untroubled by his gaze.

  “How old are you?”

  I could tell from his tone that this was a subject of vital importance and I could understand why. I had to stop and think, though. “Thirteen. My birthday’s in February, and that’s definitely past for this year.”

  “Indeed it is,” he replied, still watching me with disturbing intensity. “Why, may I ask, is a young lady like yourself living like...this?” He gestured to my urchin’s attire with a strong hand.

  I swallowed, but with anger this time, anger for my thieving uncle. “My uncle threw me from my mother’s house...from my house,” I added with a spurt of anger, “before Mother was even cold! I’ve tried to find you ever since, but...” My anger trailed off, I was too exhausted to sustain it. “It’s so hard. Has been so hard,” I corrected and trailed off entirely.

  “Your uncle? That crawling snake Baron Hendfield?”

  “Him,” I confirmed, shaking with cold and suspense.

  “And your name?”

  “Serapion,” I replied automatically, then embarrassed, lowered my eyes for a second before looking back into his. “Serapia.”

  I almost felt that touch some nerve inside him, and his face softened. “You don’t know how happy that makes me.”

  He leant forward to take my chin, which had sunk again. I flinched back, but his grip tightened slightly as he gazed intently at my face. I forced myself to remain still. His fingers traced my nose, which my nursemaid had always called strong, but which I knew was sharp and pointed. He touched my matted hair gently. It was as black as his, which hung in glossy waves, bar a single streak of white at the front. Mine wasn’t doing anything but dripping limply. It was a long time since I’d been embarrassed about my appearance; I’d had much more important things to think about.

  The Duke ran his fingers over the unusually bumpy vertebrae at the back of my neck and concluded his scrutiny with a searching look into my green eyes. Which, I noted, shivering with hopeful pleasure, could have been reflections of his own.

  “Serapia,” he said at last, sitting back in his seat, “without any doubt, I am your father.”

  I closed my eyes and a long sigh of relief escaped me. Oh, thank you! Thank you! He was my father. Surely he would look after me?

  “That does not surprise you?”

  I opened my eyes again to find him still watching me. “Well, no. It seemed fairly likely.”

  “She did not tell you?”

  “I have never heard one word about my father...about you...in my entire life, until today.”

  “Likewise. I hadn’t the slightest idea that you existed.” He closed his eyes for a moment and smiled, and it transformed his face with joy. “I have a daughter,” he murmured, “a child of my blood.”

  I breathed even more freely
. He was happy! But if he was so happy... “Why didn’t you know about me?” I challenged.

  A tiny frown etched itself between his brows. “I’ve been travelling for a long time, and your mother never contacted me,” he said shortly, and patted the seat beside him. “Come, sit here.”

  When I hesitated, he held out a hand to me. Since he was my father I gave him the benefit of the doubt and took his hand, but I made sure I sat far enough away that I did not get my filth on his fine clothes. And it gave me room to maneuver. I touched the hematite under my jerkin for reassurance. The slight soothing warmth I sometimes felt from the stone was there now.

  I was shivering violently by this time, for I had been drenched to the skin for some hours, and with the excitement as well, I thought I might just shake to pieces. Indeed, it was now impossible for me to hide and after a sharp look at me, he wrung out my hair with careful twists of each matted lock. I let him do so, reminding myself sternly that this was my father who was going to look after me, and he was not to be upset in any way.

  Taking a blanket from inside the opposite seat, he wrapped it around me, engulfing me in its thick, warm folds. Oh, to have had a blanket like that last winter, I thought, so lost in my sudden ecstasy of warmth that only after a moment did I realize he had put an arm around me, tucking me to him. He reached up and banged on the roof, making me jump, and shouted to the coachman, “Straight home, Richard, straight home!”

  He fussed with my blankets for a while, dropping a second over my bare feet, by now mottled blue with cold, before seeming satisfied that I was well wrapped. I felt snug beyond belief; the shivering had nearly stopped.

  “I have a very nice house here, Serapia,” he was telling me. “Or I think so. I think you will find it comfortable, at any rate. And you shall be its mistress. It has not had a mistress for a long time. Will you like that?”