"But they have denied all that."
"True, but they would. Do not forget that Lord Ivran's men are suspected of taking part in the death of Sir Renall."
She had not forgotten, and there were constant reminders. Renall, Anna's husband, had been grand chamberlain to the king since before Madia was born. He had fallen prey to robbers on the road. Villagers found him with his sword still in his hand and many wounds to mark the fierceness of the battle, the valiant death he had finally suffered. But riders had been seen, heading north on the road that same day wearing armor bearing the crest of Bouren, the mark of Lord Ivran's crown and scabbards.
More than a year ago, she realized, recalling it now, since the Lord Ferris had taken his place.
For his part Lord Ferris seemed competent, though she thought he had changed somewhat along with his new status; he had never been a strong or influential individual in the past, or he hadn't shown it. Lately, he seemed to offer council constantly, and her father tended to listen.
"The king does not ask for my help, and I doubt he needs it," Madia told him.
"Perhaps, but he does not need a daughter who constantly insists on adding to his problems, who humiliates and embarrasses him repeatedly, despite his best efforts to reason with her. He does not need enemies. The lords, squires and gentry of the city are laughing at him. His detractors have begun to cast doubt on his ability to control nations when he cannot control one girl. He has never been tested in a great war as his father was. He is under constant scrutiny from all quarters and must continually prove himself a fitting leader in many small ways, lest he prove himself unfit."
"Oh, that's absurd!" Madia sneered. "He is easily as great a king as his father. Everyone from the ports of Neleva to Ikaydin knows that to be true. He has kept his father's word and law, and kept the peace. All the realm has prospered. I cannot believe that the northern lords would plot against him, or that I can so easily ruin him, and neither should you."
"Only yesterday," Sir Tristan said, "Lord Ferris spoke of robbers in growing numbers along many of our trade routes. He believes they are organized and owe their allegiance to the northern lords, or to the merchant guilds of Glister and Brintel, which grow more powerful every day. They breed fear and unrest throughout the land. Who do you believe militant villagers might side with if there is a war? If the desert tribes swept into eastern Ariman tomorrow, or if the fiefs revolt, would the people trust King Kelren to protect them?"
Madia said nothing. Sir Tristan somehow made his face even longer. "Your father has already called many of the men of Ariman to arms, and Ferris has begun hiring soldiers as an early precaution, but such men need a leader. Ariman needs an unblemished king to follow. A strong king. And one day, perhaps, a strong queen."
Madia clasped her hands tightly together, felt them shaking just slightly even so. She was a possible heir to the throne by birth, but she had never been able to imagine herself as any sort of queen! She knew that her blood was something she would have to face one day, like aging, like death, yet she had managed to put off the truth quite well for most of her life.
And there was her cousin, the young Duke Andarys, son to her father's long dead brother. He had always been seen as the more likely heir, and Madia had made no protest, but the fool had set out on a tour of the realm four years ago, the moment his uncle had deemed him old enough. Word of his adventuring had come from time to time, until two years ago, when he had been seen heading over the Spartooth Mountains toward the lands beyond. Another message arrived a year after that: news only that the duke was alive and well, and a promise to return in good time. But with the passage of yet another year and no further news, hopes had begun to dim.
Now, Madia's official destiny threatened to close in on her, to hunt her down. For in her cousin's absence, her father had grown older, and she had grown into a young woman. Madia loathed the thought of inheriting the throne.
"You have underestimated my father," Madia said, glancing at Tristan, fielding his stare as best she could.
"You have failed him."
She took a breath, mouth closed tight, nostrils flared as she stepped into the hall, then she reached out and pulled her door shut, cracking oak against stone with a jolt that echoed like cannon fire.
"My father is waiting," she said, and brushed past.
* * *
The day's gathering found the king's officials present in numbers: squires and lords, stewards, chancellors, men-at-arms and gentry, their silk or gold-trimmed tunics and embroidered dresses complimenting the silk and sendal hangings that adorned the high walls. Even the Holy Prelate from the city's Church of the Greater Gods was in attendance. Tristan took his place beside the chancellor and Grand Chamberlain Ferris. Lady Anna stood before the throne, waiting for Madia. She gestured, directing Madia to join her there.
Lord Ferris watched her unwaveringly, a face with too many wrinkles for an otherwise fit man of no more than forty, and eyes that never seemed to match his expression, eyes that made Madia feel physically uneasy, as if she were about to come down with some seasonal illness. She took comfort in the distance between them. A strange man, she thought, and no substitute for Anna's husband.
The crier announced Madia's presence. King Kelren Andarys, Lord Baron of all Ariman and the great northern fiefs, leaned forward and looked down at her for a moment, finding her with a scowl as intense as any she had seen before, but mixed with some newer—stress, perhaps.
Ferris whispered something in the king's ear. Kelren nodded but did not break his gaze.
"My daughter," the king said, loud enough that the words echoed back to Madia from behind, "this is to be the last time we will speak of your duties to the crown, and your duties to me. Today I make a proclamation: from the princess of Ariman there will be no further disobedience, no more reports of scandal or disgrace. Not from this day forward. As of this very moment!"
Kelren rose nearly out of his seat, the lines on his forehead growing dark with the redness that flushed his face. With age her father had grown anything but impulsive, was in fact known for an ability to control his temper in the most upsetting circumstances—usually, Madia reflected.
Earnest as she could be, she took one step forward. "I do apologize, Father. Of course I will make every effort to control my—"
"You have already made your efforts a hundred times, my daughter, as have I. And Lady Anna has made every effort as well, yet nothing works. Nothing lasts against your whims. No one seems able to reach your soul, if you still have one! Your teachers once spoke of a bright young girl, capable of mastering the sciences and the arts, medicine and philosophy, all as easily as she learned to charm her father. Yet this child-turned-woman now refuses to apply or control herself. Instead, she continually disobeys! She persists in disrupting not only her educators but her father's ability to rule!"
"My lord, I promise you," Madia replied quickly, somewhat stunned by her father's intensity, "as the Greater Gods are my witness, I have lately come to hold true remorse in my heart for my conduct." She gazed up at her father, making her eyes as big as possible, unblinking, so that the air would irritate them enough to bring a swell of moisture. "With the continued absence of my cousin, may the Gods keep and protect him, I have begun to see my station more clearly, and to recognize my many errors. In the future, I swear—"
Her father held his hand up, a command for silence. Madia had no choice but to comply.
"Whether the young duke returns or not, your actions undermine all I try to do," he said. "You have earned yourself a reputation that no one of royal blood would envy, yet for all your well-timed penitent moods, you do not seem to care. You say you are sorry day after day like a drunkard each morning, swearing off his ale."
He paused for breath and the edges on his face seemed to soften somewhat, though again, it was a look Madia was hardly familiar with. "I have finally come to believe that you hold no genuine regret in your heart at all. And therefore, no feelings for me."
"Not true!" Madia forgot herself. She stepped forward and up again until she stood nearly level to the throne. "You must not believe such things. Who fills your head with these lies?"
"My head can think for itself, just as my eyes can see. I am not blind, and not the idiot you take me for. Not completely. You, my daughter, have no right to speak of truth in this house."
"But I have every right! I am your daughter!"
"No daughter would continue to act as you have. For years I have believed you would finally grow up and come to good sense. But I have run out of time and patience and heart, and even hope. How long can a man love his own blood without any love in return?"
"Again you claim I do not love you. But I do!"
"Then prove it, Madia! Swear before your king and the court that you will bring no further disgrace upon yourself or this throne, upon your land. Swear it, and know that if you break your word, this time you will be sent away from this house and this city, cast out, until time and hardship have made you fit to return, or until a new life, or death, should find you. Rally the woman within you, if she is there at all!"
"I swear! I do swear!" Madia fell on both knees. She felt the blood ringing in her ears, heat flushing her face. She was blinking now, her sight blurred by genuine tears brought on by the sheer level of her emotions. She refrained from using her arm to wipe her cheek.
"Very well, but there will be no more discussion of this, my daughter. You have given your word to me and to all of Ariman, and I have given mine!"
King Kelren settled back into his throne. Grand Chamberlain Ferris leaned and whispered something in his ear again. The king seemed to nod. Madia bowed her head until her forehead touched the floor, then she slowly rose. There was nothing to say, nothing to do but turn and go. All eyes were upon her as she looked about. She wiped her face, then fixed her gaze on the stone beneath her feet as she paced slowly away, Lady Anna close behind her. Two young guards in gleaming, polished armor let them out of the hall. Madia knew one of the men well—but said nothing as she passed.
* * *
She could not eat with the rest of the house tonight, not after what her father had said to her, so Madia had food brought to her room. The bitterness of their meeting clung heavily, annoyingly to her. He was making too much of nothing, she reasoned, as kings sometimes did. He was losing his perspective, or didn't care to keep it. He's getting old, she thought. Her mother had died during childbirth, and Madia had always suspected that her father held her partly responsible in some way, though he would never admit to it. If he had found someone else these many years, a new queen to temper his moods and comfort him now and then, he might well act otherwise. If my mother were alive, certainly. . . .
As she ate her goose and bread and sipped a cup of wine, the thought of leaving Kamrit of her own accord crossed her mind. If her father did not love her, then how many others did? Or perhaps it simply didn't matter. He seemed determined to make the rest of her life the means of payment for all her past "sins." No longer the sweet, affable father of years gone by. A tyrant now, she thought. The kingdom beware!
She finished her meal and changed again into fresh undergarments and a deep claret-colored full dress with a low-cut bodice and tight sleeves. Then she plaited her hair and put it up under a short headdress and veil. When the chambermaid returned to take her plate, Lady Anna entered with her. The girl left quickly. Anna remained.
"You have somewhere to go?" she asked.
"A walk. I like to walk after I've eaten."
"Sometimes that is what you like to do."
Madia furnished the other with an abusive stare. Anna seemed to take it in stride. She reached out and touched the fine trim at the end of Madia's sleeve, then eyed the rest of the dress. "A bit snug at the waist, isn't it?" she asked. "And this," she added, waving at Madia's amply revealed neck and shoulders and cleavage.
"Not especially."
"Do not go to that young man tonight, Madia, please."
"But I make no such plans."
"You do, though I don't know why. Suppose you are caught? You heard your father! You saw the look on his face when he warned you. You swore an oath, Madia. He will hold you to your word, and he will keep his."
"I will not be caught! And my father would never truly banish me, not for any reason. Surely you can't believe otherwise. He is angry, yes, and apparently more upset than I imagined. But I am sure that's why he put on such a show, in order to frighten me into obedience. Wonderful theatrics, Anna, but little more. And frighten me he did! He may be losing his senses, but I am not. I will change. I will attempt to repair my ways." She closed her eyes and shook her head.
"I will conduct myself in a manner more fitting of my station, and all the rest. But if, just tonight, I happened to have an appointment with a perfectly lovely man, perhaps one last little adventure, then I would be most inclined to keep it. If! Tell me this, my lady, how will I ever marry if I do not see men?"
"Seeing them would be fine," Anna said, "if those visits were chaperoned, and if they stopped at that."
Madia grinned at her. "I remember wrestling with many of these same boys in the castle not so many years ago."
"I know," Anna said, "rough and tumble as any of them. But what has that to do with—"
"My father did not approve of that, either."
"This is different," Anna said.
Madia grinned all the more. "Oh, I know it is."
Anna frowned deeply. She looked about, as if searching for what to say next.
"Besides, any man, even someone like, for instance, Sir Calif, would have to live up to my expectations before he and I would engage in any . . . wrestling."
"Then I pray he is a dolt!" Anna snapped without a hint of humor. There would be no peace between them tonight.
"In the morning, we will talk more," Madia said. "And I will improve, you will see. I promise. But leave me now. I must go."
"You must not," Anna muttered.
"I already have," Madia replied, and whisked herself away, leaving Lady Anna alone in the chamber.
* * *
No one was about in the inner courtyard as darkness approached, except of course, Sir Calif. Wearing hose and a white shirt of fine linen, with blackwork at the neck and cuffs, and a short pourpoint coat over that, he looked as fine as any man Madia had known. He smiled warmly when he saw her approach, and Madia found the expression quite satisfactory.
"I was not sure I would find you out this evening," he said. "Word of your father's admonishments at court have spread to all the corners of the realm by now."
He was still smiling. Not an easily shaken man, Madia thought, appraising him further. He took her hand in his, bold again, then held it very gently. Young Calif had a great deal to live up to, Madia thought, recalling some of the men she had dallied with, the finest knights in all of Ariman. Though truly, he just might measure up.
She let him lead her on through the courtyard, and listened as he told her of his father's lands, of his own visions for the future. He had plans to clear more acres, and to enlarge his father's rather small manor, to make room for the family he would have. Some day. Then, as they arrived outside the king's stables, Calif began to talk about her, the way she looked in the moonlight, the way he imagined she must feel when properly held. Not awfully original any of it, Madia noted, but not bad, either. And she found herself wondering about him in that way as well.
She paused and stood close, facing him, just in front of one of the stable doors. "Then you must hold me," she said, "so that we will know."
After they had kissed, a long and passionate kiss, Madia let him lead her to the stable's ample supply of fresh August hay, where she let him hold her as he willed. In a few moments they were nearly naked, and locked in an evolving embrace of warmth and passion broken only by dry straw that nipped at Madia's fencing bruise. She ignored this almost completely. A moment later, she heard the metal rustle of armor, and the both of them sat up at attention.
They
found themselves under the close scrutiny of four of the king's soldiers, and behind them, Lord Grand Chamberlain Ferris—and behind him, already turning away, the king.
* * *
The seneschal Tristan stood just outside the city's southern gates looking the girl over carefully. She appeared as much like a merchant's daughter as anything, thick woolen hose and a blouse of heavy linen, a dreary look, though her coat fit her snugly enough to make plain her femininity; it was made of fur and leather and covered her well to just above the knees, and was a bit too fine to be any but her own. A plain hood covered her head, her thick brown hair falling past her shoulders from underneath it.
Around her neck she wore a thin gold chain that bore a palm-sized circular gold medallion, its surface engraved with the king's mark and her own name, something Anna and her father had decided to give her, proof that she was who she claimed to be, should she need to present it. At her side hung a sheath filled with her favorite short sword, which the king had not objected to. Tristan handed her a leather drawstring pouch filled with food and necessities, and a few gold pieces. She hung it grimly around herself by the drawn cord.
"Keep the medallion under your blouse," Lady Anna suggested, taking hold of it and tucking it in. Madia stood limply, hands at her sides, allowing the intrusion.
"Your identity will bring you honor by some, but others might make a toy of you, or seek to ransom you back to your father," Tristan added. Then he tipped his head to her. "You have said nothing since we left your chambers, my lady." Madia only shrugged.
"Is there anything you would know, or anyone I should send word to?" Anna asked, her voice too thin, Tristan thought—not quite crying, but the woman was unable to still her chin.
Madia glared at Anna suddenly, a look that came from nowhere. "Word of what?" she asked wildly. "Would you tell others of your acts of betrayal?"
Anna shook her head. "I did not betray you, Madia."
"I am no fool! The fact is obvious, after all, despite what you say. My father was told of my rendezvous with Calif. We were followed, as well you know, whether you admit it or not. My own father has betrayed me—why shouldn't you?"
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