by Matthew Berg
But without Janelle to occupy his time this day, he showed up for classes early. And when he arrived at the side door to the monastery, only Laudan was there to greet him. He was still and quiet, as he always was, and his posture was erect, but there was something else about the way he was holding himself that made Breeden feel he had changed. He seemed more fidgety. And less . . . something. Not cocky. He was never Kestrel to begin with. And Breeden would never have thought to call him cocky before. What was the change though? Was he less confident? Less solid? Perhaps it was simply the fact that the wind had been taken from his sails during the activities of the last few days.
Breeden didn’t want to upset him, but he couldn’t think of anything else to say and couldn’t help himself. “Good morning! So, what did Captain Jenlyns say to you, anyway?”
Laudan looked mildly shocked for a moment by the question, but then he slowly smiled. “I suppose I can’t avoid that one, eh?”
Breeden was glad he hadn’t made Laudan upset or angry with the question. He felt that his relationship with Laudan was much less established than what he had with Kestrel or Oskar. And he didn’t want to disrupt what goodwill they did have for each other. But the words had left his mouth before he realized they might be taken badly.
“Well, he basically told me that, at my size and as a knight in training, I was obligated to be a protector of the king’s subjects and holdings. And that I needed to obey my superiors without question and without emotion before I could ever hope to wear the king’s badge. There was more, but I’d rather not talk about it.”
Breeden nodded his head. “That’s fair. It did seem like he was being pretty hard on you.”
Laudan nodded his head slowly in reply. “That he did.”
“Well, it’s good to have you back!”
“Good to be back. Let me tell you!”
“So, did you hear that the princess was asking after you?”
Laudan’s demeanor changed in an instant, all joviality fleeing and his attention focusing on Breeden. “What?” His voice cracked, the word loud but unsteady.
“Kestrel didn’t tell you already?” Breeden couldn’t keep the surprise from his voice.
“I slept in the south end of the barracks, by myself, as I have for the last few nights. They didn’t want me talking to anyone while I was being punished. And last night they wanted me to spend one more night alone, thinking on what I’d done. But wait, the princess asked about me?”
“She did. We saw her talking to one of the sergeants while you were walking the box. She gestured toward you as they talked. Kestrel stopped the sergeant later on and asked him what they’d talked about. Supposedly, she asked what you’d done wrong and smiled when she heard the story. Is she crazy or what? Smiling that you nearly split Ranald in half! And then, of course, there’s that bit with the girl stepping on her dress!”
Laudan frowned briefly at the reference to his hurting the squire, but then his mind seemed to spin through a cycle of thoughts and emotions. He looked like he wanted to be happy with the news but hadn’t yet figured out whether he should be. Breeden laughed. “She’s not the crazy one! You’re the one who thinks he can marry the future queen!”
Laudan looked suddenly like his old self again and reached across the space between them, seemingly ready to give Breeden one of the slaps or punches he typically reserved for Kestrel. Then he caught himself. Breeden couldn’t tell whether he slowed his punch because he realized it was Breeden before him, not Kestrel, or whether he did so because he had learned a lesson over the past few days. But then he finished his swing and popped Breeden gently on the shoulder. “Who says I can’t? She asked about me!”
And Breeden laughed, just as Kestrel and Derek appeared from around the corner.
22
The Princess
Princess Lorelei sat at a low table, brushing her long blond hair and idly gazing out of the north-facing window of Ridderzaal’s royal suite, situated at the top of one of the castle’s four main towers. The view was a stunning one that overlooked the entire city, down to the deepwater piers, and afforded a sweeping view of Long Lake and the surrounding countryside. To the west of the lake were a series of low bluffs and steep hills dotted with vineyards as far to the north as she could see. To the east, she could just make out the southern range of the dwarven mountains, their tops shrouded in dark clouds that looked to be trapped against the mountains’ shoulders. And of the lake itself, Lorelei could see for so many leagues to the north it was beyond her ability to put the distance in practical terms, such as the number of days by boat or carriage.
She was pensive. And the one thing she couldn’t get from her mind was the image she had of the young knight in training who had been punished for not checking his blows. She knew how he felt. She didn’t believe in holding back. She thought that letting someone else win something they didn’t deserve taught weakness. She felt it was only through establishing her dominance among all people that she could promote in them the healthy degree of fear and respect she needed to be an effective ruler. Despite her father’s desire to protect her, she didn’t believe she could afford to waste time the way he would have her do. “Let yourself be a child, Lorelei! Cherish this time while you don’t carry the burden of the kingdom upon your shoulders!” he would admonish her.
To meet that end, her father was trying to cloister her away from the intrigues and temptations of court by secreting her in this literal backwater of a town. She knew what had been asked of Cedric as well. She knew that her father was concerned about her moral and spiritual growth. It was so obvious to her that her own father didn’t trust her, and so frustrating that he didn’t think she was capable of ruling! She would be a great and powerful queen. Her father would be deemed weak by comparison. He needn’t worry about her.
But even more than her father, it was the other nobles at court and her father’s advisers in Arlon who made her furious. Their glances told Lorelei all she needed to know about their faith and trust. They saw the decline of a great line of kings—arguably one of the greatest Erda had ever seen. And they saw a frail girl as his sole heir. Lorelei knew, and her father constantly sought to reassure her, that if her father should die, most would serve her out of loyalty, despite the disappointment that their favorite king was gone. But Lorelei needed no one to tell her that some would also see her father’s death as an opportunity.
She saw this young knight as another way she might strengthen her position against that day. While her original attraction to him had been a somewhat detached admiration and sympathy—and admittedly somewhat physical as well—she later learned that his father was Odilon Marchant, Duke of Guéret and third in line behind her and her father for the throne of Hyrde and all of its kingdom states. She had been stunned that he should be hidden away here, as she was. But then she learned that he had an older brother ahead of him in succession to his father’s duchy, and the potential succession to king should something happen to Lorelei’s line. But still, the potential was there. And not so far removed as to be insignificant.
Lorelei had been considering that potential for a few days now and had finally decided to pursue it. And she was ready to start putting other plans into action as well.
Her plans for cementing her rule had become extensive, and her network of agents and spies was growing. But she had had trouble gaining her father’s assistance in taking such steps as she felt would assure an easy transition upon his death. He had constantly reminded her that temperance was called for, that his trusted advisers would remain loyal to her, and that she didn’t need to scheme and plot.
She had watched him earn the trust of his charges only with great difficulty over the years. She saw how he was frequently distracted by having to bend his will to some compromise with a minor noble or even a merchant. To her eyes, he was capering before those who owed their obeisance to his crown. Lorelei didn’t see why power—her power and her father’s power—shouldn’t be used to enforce and inspire loyalty. Sh
e felt that to have power and not use it was a waste of that power and a sign of weakness. She would often argue with her father on this point. And she wasn’t unreasonable or childish in her arguments. Rather, she felt she was circumspect and thoughtful when she argued that an extraordinary exertion of might was a useful tool in and of itself. But her father would frown and dismiss her proposals as youthful enthusiasm whenever she shared them with him.
It was in this way she had come to believe her father was weak, despite the many victories he had won in battle and politics over the years of his long reign.
Her brush caught a snarl in her hair, and pulled her head downward before she could stop herself. She swore and the reverie was broken. She was back in the castle tower, thoughts of her father and her past debates with him vanished.
Looking out over Long Lake, the princess noticed that it had begun to rain.
23
Lady-in-Waiting
Janelle was nearly at the top of the long, winding stairway when she heard the princess curse. She picked up her pace, and in a handful of heartbeats, she was at the chamber door, knocking softly.
The princess barked, “What is it?”
Janelle was torn between answering and scurrying away. Best not to hesitate. When she spoke, she had to steel herself to ensure her voice came out firmly and strong. “It is Janelle, Your Highness, here to attend to your matins.”
“Well, come in, then.” There had been a slight pause. And Janelle hoped she had heard a softening of the princess’s tone, but she couldn’t be sure.
Janelle sighed beneath hearing as she took in the scene before her, of the beautiful young princess seated in front of a window overlooking the world. The morning sun was not visible, but an orange glow stained the distant sky and cast an odd warmth against the bottoms of the low black and grey rain clouds. The earthy smell of the rain felt cleaner up here at the heights of the castle’s tower.
To Janelle, the moment captured perfectly the feel of one of the stories she had heard as a child, of a fair princess trapped in a tower by an unreasonable father. Janelle briefly imagined that a brave young knight who loved her—like Laudan—would have to rescue her so they could run away together. Not for the first time, Janelle wondered if that might not be closer to the truth than she knew. But she was not yet familiar enough with the young princess, and might never be so familiar as to ask about her relationship with her father and the reasons for her presence at Ridderzaal.
Janelle stood inside the doorway for some time, patiently waiting for the princess to instruct her. After a week of learning the princess’s routine, Janelle well understood what the princess expected of her. And the first lesson she had learned was never to assume that things should be done in the same order or in the same way as the day before. A simple enough lesson, thought Janelle, and one her own more capricious side could appreciate.
Lorelei brushed her hair in silence.
The moment grew longer, and Janelle kept herself as still as she could. To fill the void and keep her visage from showing any impatience, she allowed her mind to wander. Briefly she thought about Breeden and wondered what her friends were learning about in class. She cracked a smile. Breeden was such an odd boy. Most of the time, he was quiet and unassuming, and even serious. But other times, he was almost ferocious in his response to an argument or debate in class, and then there were the fights with Derek. It was clear to Janelle that Breeden was no sheep, though Derek obviously couldn’t help but think of him that way. Janelle smiled again, despite herself.
Lorelei appeared to realize that Janelle was not uncomfortable waiting for the long minutes she required, and she frowned. When she spoke, it seemed she was trying to let Janelle know that she had felt rushed. “All right, enough fidgeting. I need you to untangle my hair—here.” The words were impatiently but not necessarily unkindly or harshly spoken. Janelle responded immediately, picking up a slender ivory comb with three long teeth.
The princess had managed to make the knot worse by her own ministrations, but Janelle made short work of the knot and soon shifted from the comb to the princess’s fine horsehair brush. She couldn’t help but admire the princess’s hair as she brushed. It truly was like spun gold. Her mooning friends would find this one reality, at least, not to be the letdown their other ideals of the princess might prove to be.
Over the past week since she had been serving the future queen, Janelle had come to establish something of a friendship with the girl, and even liked her, she supposed. But most of the shine of serving the crown princess had dulled when Janelle had borne witness to enough of the girl’s petulance and unpredictability. Fortunately for Janelle, she had yet to make more than the simplest of mistakes in treating with the princess and had therefore earned a rare affection from her. But other members of the household staff were not so confidently well-mannered as Janelle, and therefore not so well received by the princess.
Some mistakes were unforgivable. Those who made such mistakes were dismissed, and it was well understood that they should never again come within sight of the princess. Janelle’s position, of course, was the result of just such a series of dismissals. Janelle told herself that the future queen didn’t care about nobility so much as ability. But she guessed the likelier reality was that Ridderzaal had run out of young girls of noble blood. Janelle had to admit that she’d probably been, if not the only option, certainly the one option within many leagues with a chance of succeeding where the others before her had failed.
Janelle’s pride kept her mind from casting aside the last thin curtain, which would reveal the truth: she was tolerated for her competence, and the most this would ever serve to gain for her was the princess’s grudging satisfaction with her work. But today her pride would hang a second curtain across that threshold, as the princess surprised her by asking that she accompany her to church for her morning prayers. And even more remarkably, accompany her afterward for her morning walk!
24
Crafting
It was Sunday, and as such, Breeden had no lessons. He was in his father’s workshop, and everything had been cleared away from the center of the room except for several heavy wooden pegs that were driven into holes to form a wide arc in the floor. And of course, there was also the fitfully steaming wooden box that ran the length of the room.
From out of the seams, and from several thumb-size holes cut along the length of the box on both sides, steam was issuing forth in jets as if a dozen tiny dragons were trapped inside. Breeden was smiling broadly at the back of the room in admiration of the spectacle. His gloved hand was on the door of a small brick oven boiling the water that fed steam to the box through an awkward-looking rectangular “pipe” made of wood. He was increasing and decreasing the amount of air he allowed into the oven, following periodic instructions from his father.
His father was waiting expectantly at the opposite end of the box, hands and arms covered to the armpit by heavy leather blacksmith’s gloves. Breeden wasn’t sure why his father’s expression was so intense as he stared at the box. Breeden knew he couldn’t be looking at the wood inside, because it was obscured by the gouts of white that issued forth in an endless flow from within the box’s confines.
Then, for no reason apparent to Breeden beyond some inner chronometer or intuition, and with only a garbled “Now!” his father grabbed a loop of rope at the end of the box and pulled free the end panel to which it was attached. More startlingly, even knowing what his father was about, Breeden watched him reach into the box and begin to withdraw a heavy ironwood timber from the steam. As he had been instructed, Breeden closed the oven door and raced over to help his father. Breeden’s gloves weren’t nearly as long as his father’s, and he traded places at the free end of the timber, allowing his father to take the end still emerging from the box. It was all Breeden could do not to drop the wood. Ironwood was one of the denser woods in the land, and this piece was huge.
When the entire length of wood had been removed from the box, they s
huffled sideways a few steps, and Breeden dropped his end between two pegs set closely together at one end of the room. Not a moment too soon, thought Breeden. He wasn’t sure he could have held on to it for another second.
“Now we slow down just a bit. Can’t bend it too fast, or we may splinter it.” His father’s voice was thin as he gasped for breath from the exertion.
Together they maneuvered and carefully bent the steam-softened timber into the oversized jig without mishap. Once it was in place, Breeden’s father took off his gloves and grabbed a mallet and a small box of pegs, and drove them into additional holes in the floor to round out the arc of the rapidly cooling keel of Aegir’s boat.
Breeden’s father stood up when he was satisfied, and allowed himself a small smile. “That’s far and away the biggest bit of bending I’ve ever done. I wasn’t sure we’d get it in place before it cooled.”
Breeden wore a detached look and was scanning the product of their labor. A second later he had returned, and he smiled back at his father. “No splintering or cracking. It’s incredible! And the strength of the wood is returning already. I never would have thought you could bend something so rigid. What you did with the steam is sort of like what I did with the hinges in the old armory that time. Only I just broke the ‘grain’ of the metal. You changed the grain of the wood.” Breeden’s heart dropped, and he realized immediately that his father didn’t know about his visit to the cellars of the keep. He realized just as quickly that there was no way for him to take back the words.
