Half the young men of the Impire were ready to fall at her feet, and the only man she wanted was not there.
Emshandar smiled approvingly at her as they began the procession. “It never ceases to amaze me,” he said whimsically, “how feminine beauty always manages to triumph over the worst outrages that dressmakers can commit!”
Inos granted him a maidenly blush — she was quite good at those now. “Your Majesty is most gracious.” She murmured an appreciation of the surroundings.
They paraded forward, acknowledging the smiles and salutes of the company, all of whom would in turn join on the end of the promenade. Emshandar made polite conversation about nothing …
“Any sign of Rap?” he asked quietly, his expression not changing.
Inos did not let her reaction reach the hand she rested on his jeweled vambrace. “None, Sire.”
The withered old lips smiled sadly. “I commanded his presence! So we see who rules this Impire, don’t we?”
More smiles. Nod to the new consul and his pretty wife.
“Do you know Death Bird?” Emshandar muttered. Confidential remarks in Hub were usually made with minimum lip movement.
“No, Sire, I don’t think so.”
“A goblin, the one Kalkor brought. He has some other name, but the wardens call him Death Bird, for some reason.”
Inos beamed at Kade, being squired by Senator Epoxague. “Then I do know him. Rap called him Little Chicken and said he was his slave.”
Emshandar was still looking everywhere but at Inos. “Olybino is enraged. He says the goblin has been spying on military training camps, disguised as an imp.”
She barely contained an unseemly snigger. “How do you disguise a goblin as an imp? Boil him in strong tea?” She acknowledged Marshal Ithy with one of her larger smiles.
“With sorcery.”
“Oh!” She apologized. Then a few implications registered and she broke the rules by looking straight at the imperor and speaking plainly. “That’s no behavior for a guest!” Spying, when there was a war on? Goblins and winter together had driven the XIIth Legion back from the pass, the most humiliating setback the Impire had suffered in years. She knew that reinforcements were being sent.
Emshandar’s eyes twinkled, even as he nodded respectfully to the widow of a famous senator. “Rap asked permission, and I said he could do anything he wanted. That was my big mistake, you see! I should have excluded this evening from that sufferance.” They had reached the orchestra. As lead couple they veered to the right …
He chuckled. “I also told Olybino to complain directly to Rap about it if he had worries. That son of a mule went chalky pale and disappeared!”
The first real dance of the evening she had promised to Tiffy, and it was a brisk fandango, designed to clear the floor of older folk. It was also brisk enough to produce a marked list in Inos’s coiffure. With a hasty apology to the next promised partner, she headed for the powder room to put things to rights.
As she was returning, sweeping along a dim corridor, she suddenly sensed that he was there.
Rap!
She wasn’t sure how she knew, but she was certain.
She stopped and stood still, keeping her eyes lowered. Somehow she located him, in the shadows of a doorway. Minutes seeped by. No one else came, there was no sound except the muffled beat of the orchestra, and her heart was louder than that. But she knew he was there, watching.
Very slowly she raised her head. At first, she dared not look straight at him. It was like meeting a wild animal, a deer or a fox. If she made a sudden move she would scare him away. He would be gone in an instant.
He was as well dressed as any man in the palace, better than she had ever imagined him. Silver-buckled shoes, snowy tights — including a frilly codpiece as outrageous as any young gallant’s — ruffled cravat and cutaway velvet coat …
And by all the Gods his hair was flat!
Finally she met his eyes — wild, tortured eyes, staring at her with a mute, unbearable longing that twisted her heart. The tattoos were missing.
He had done all this for her, she knew. She could never have conceived Rap dressing up like this, even if he had done it with sorcery.
Still moving very gently, raising a hand as she might coax a squirrel to a crust … “Don’t speak,” she said softly. “Just come and dance.”
He nodded and swallowed hard. He came forward timorously, as if she were a soap bubble vision that might vanish if he touched her, or as if he feared to waken himself with any sudden move. She shook her head when he seemed about to say something.
She took out her dance card and ripped it in two, dropping the pieces. She grinned at him invitingly, and he managed a small quirk of a smile in response, and then she knew that she had won — it was going to be all right.
She felt the callouses on his fingers as he took her hand.
He led her to the ballroom.
Her promised partner was waiting. He blanched when he saw her with a faun, and Inos ignored him.
Rap was going to dance with her!
Sorcerers made wonderful dance partners, graceful and flawless. He never took his eyes off Inos. No matter how complex the pattern, or who else he might be whirling or leading, his gaze was always on her. He never spoke. He did not smile, he just stared, with that same mute longing.
He danced like an elf. Fingers touched fingers, hand touched shoulder, arm around waist … the night flew away, and she danced with Rap. Minuets and sarabands, and she danced with Rap. Polonaise, tarantella, danced with Rap. Gavottes and courantes and mazurkas. Rap!
She hardly spoke, either, all night long. She smiled to wide-eyed acquaintances, she spun around with men she knew or didn’t know, but always she was dancing with Rap. And she knew that whatever else the Gods might do, They could not call back this night.
Hub did nothing except by ritual and tradition. The imperor’s partner was expected to reserve certain especial dances for each of the consuls, and Marshal Ithy, and some others. Inos danced with Rap and no one intruded on a sorcerer.
But even a sorcerer could not stop the sunrise. Unbelieving, she saw candles guttering in the chandeliers and weary footmen hauling back drapes to let the sickly light of morn seep through high windows. The floor was almost empty. Red-eyed musicians held the last fading chord of the final dance. Where had the time gone? She could have danced forever.
All over the hall, the couples were closing the evening with the traditional embrace. She held out her arms to Rap and lifted her lips to be kissed.
He backed off.
“Rap!”
He shook his head wildly.
“Rap, kiss me!”
“No!” he shouted. “No!” Then he lowered his voice to a sob. “Oh, Inos! Do you think I wouldn’t if I dared?”
“Tell me!” she said, moving toward him. “You’re a sorcerer! You overcame the strongest of the warlocks! Who are you afraid of?”
He gulped. “You!”
“No!”
“No. Me!”
And he was gone, vanished. Plop.
Rap! How could he be so callous? Stunned, Inos walked to the door alone, and there found Kade. Kade, haggard with exhaustion. Kade who should have gone off to bed hours ago.
Kade who held her as she started to weep.
5
She met him again on Winterfest Day.
The bells were ringing, and she was accompanying the imperor to church. The morning was all faded to gray, sky and earth grown old together, and the towers of the White Palace in the distance were pearly-white ghosts. Frost flakes hung glinting everywhere, as if the air had frozen around them to hold them up. Stones and the stark, bare trees were pale with rime.
The only color left in the world was in the long procession winding across the cobbled court, ladies and gentlemen in their high-collared cloaks and soft plumed hats. Reds and greens and gold shimmered when everything else was white. The spectators were few, drab and muffled. Most folk were already at wors
hip, or else home with their families this day, preparing whatever feast their means could supply. Anyone who chose to hang around the palace and watch the gentry on Winterfest had something missing from his life.
Inos was well back in the parade, being squired by the adoring Tiffy. His spurs clinked softly with every step. Kade and Senator Epoxague walked just ahead, and the royal family at the front had already passed through a columned arcade and entered the church. The bells pealed joyously, the frosty air sparkled, and sometimes tiny snowflakes tickled her eyelashes. In her mind she was rehearsing all the prayers she would make. For Rap. For Krasnegar. For wisdom and courage and dedication to make a good ruler. For the strength to trust in love. But especially for Rap, whatever troubled him so.
As she drew near the ancient arches, she knew he was there. Two words of power had brought her no occult abilities that she knew of, so what she felt was a sending from Rap.
She peered, this way and that, and finally located the solitary figure by one of the great weathered pillars.
She murmured an apology to Tiffy and reinforced it with the most beguiling smile she could muster. On him her smiles were hot coals on butter. Then she scurried away from the procession, holding her cloak tight against the cold, clasping its high collar up to protect her ears. She rounded the pillar.
Rap was leaning against it, arms folded, watching her with no expression that she could read. He was back to artisan work clothes, but spurning both coat and hat — a sorcerer’s ears would never freeze. His hair had recovered its moorland look, and the stupid goblin tattoos disfigured his eyes again.
“You called me!”
He nodded, looking surly. “Wondered what you thought you were doing.”
“I was going to go and worship the Gods.”
“That’s what I was afraid of.” His voice was bitter as alum.
Oh, Rap! “I think you should explain that remark.”
He curled his lip. “Sorcerers play games with mundanes. The wardens play games with nations. What do you think the Gods do for amusement?”
She had never heard such rank blasphemy in her life, and for a moment it took her breath away.
“You met a God!” Rap said, his voice rising.
The church doors thumped closed … one! … two! The bells had stopped ringing. The knots of spectators were wandering away from the gray and white yard.
“They told me to trust in love,” she said.
“And what did that mean? You didn’t know, did you? Andor, you thought. Then Azak, you thought. Now Rap, you think. ‘Yes, he is only a common coachman, but the Gods have given me special dispensation —’”
“It meant that I must rescue you from the fire, my lad.”
He shrugged. “Did it? You’re still not sure. Not certain. You don’t think an ambiguous command may reflect on the competence of the commander? Or reflect on Their sincerity, maybe? Cause a little confusion and watch the fun, perhaps?”
“Rap, you stop this! I won’t listen!”
He shrugged again. She spoke quickly, before he could. “You told me you were only a mage, but the next morning you were a sorcerer. Where did you get that fourth word, Rap?”
“Can’t tell that.”
“Kade told me where you got the third word, and I saw you get a fifth, but where did you get your fourth? You begged a word from me, but I didn’t have one. Who else had a word to share. Rap? What did you pay for that word?”
He flinched, and her suspicions swelled to horror.
“Bright Water!” she whispered.
“Nonsense!”
“I think so! Maybe not one of her own, but she made sure you got one. She’s very fond of that goblin monster, and —”
Rap shook his head and her tongue stopped like a balking horse.
“She had nothing to do with it! Not that I know of. Yes, Little Chicken did. But don’t worry about that.”
“Tell me what you paid for that word!” she shouted, banging her fist against the frosted stone of the pillar. There was no one else in sight now. “How can a goblin torture a sorcerer unless the sorcerer agrees to be —”
“That’s true.” For the first time a faint hint of a smile touched Rap’s eyes. “And probably not even then. I’d find it awfully hard not to lose my temper when he began breaking things.”
Relief! That nightmare had haunted her for weeks. “It isn’t going to happen then? The third prophecy?”
“Not prophecies — I told you. But, no, I don’t think it is. It isn’t quite, absolutely, completely certain, and you mustn’t talk about it with Little Chicken if you see him. But no, I don’t think he’s going to insist. Never mind that! When do you want to go to Krasnegar?”
“‘Insist?’” she queried.
“Forget Little Square-Eyes! When do you want to go to Krasnegar, and what are you going to do when you get there?”
“What do you advise?”
“You want to be queen, then you’ve got to learn to make your own decisions.”
“Rap!” Inos said crossly. “Stop playing silly games. You’ve been there?”
He nodded, looking just a tiny bit shamefaced. “I’ve glanced around. No one saw me.”
“Then report. You can’t expect me to decide when I don’t know the situation.”
He pulled a face. “It’s worse than I thought at first. This Greastax is just a young lout — he even looks like a younger version of Kalkor. His ‘men’ are mostly not much more than boys. Greastax is no thane, and the whole thing was an irregular prank. He heard about the inheritance, took a ship, and came to claim it in his brother’s name.”
“What would Kalkor have said?”
“Said?” Rap scoffed. “He’d have slaughtered the lot of them for impudence.”
“How many?” she asked, trying to remember Krasnegar in winter dark, when the streets were choked by drifts and peat was precious as gold, when fresh air was deadly and white bears might roam the harbor.
“Greastax and forty.”
“Holding the whole town?” What sort of sheep did she have for subjects? “Boys, you said? And only forty-one of them?”
Rap shook his head. “It’s easy to laugh, Inos. But you’re not there. You have no wife and children, no sisters and parents. Some of the Nordlanders have died, yes. Just youths, but they’re big, and they’re armed, and they are ruthless! The imps took away all the weapons, and these young brutes came sailing in the next day. They kill any man who talks back. Six or seven of them stirred up more than they could handle and died, but then the others slew babies and burned houses in retribution.”
It seemed all wrong that so few could tyrannize so many, but Krasnegar had no history of any warfare worse than barroom brawling. As long as the invaders were armed and united and the citizens were neither, then resistance would mean suicide or the massacre of innocents. She could see that when she remembered how Kade had been used against her in Arakkaran.
Rap was watching her intently. “He rules in Kalkor’s name, so who dares oppose him? No one can leave. Some tried, and the goblins sent back their eyes in bags. The imps wouldn’t let anyone on the ships, because no one had money.”
She shivered, and not from the cold. “I think I understand. And what can you do to help?”
For a moment the cold, ironic mask slipped, and he looked puzzled. “Me? Anything you want. Court sorcerer. I’ll melt down the castle if you tell me to.”
“That seems a little extreme.”
“You decide what you want. Load your coach when you’re ready to leave.”
“Rap!” she said hastily, frightened that he was about to vanish. “Give me a clue?”
He frowned. “If you give someone something for nothing, that’s how he’ll value it.”
“I do value —”
“I didn’t mean you. That’s your clue. Go talk to your Gods about it!” His stare became icy. “And one more thing — forget about us, Inos! There’s no you-and-me in your future! If you want a man to share your th
rone and warm your bed, you’ll have to pick some other strong lad. Not me!” Muscles clenched at the corner of his jaw. His neck was corded.
“But, Rap, why —”
“No why!” he shouted. “I’m just telling you a fact. That’s a prophecy, if you like, a real prophecy.”
“I love you, Rap.”
He shrugged. “And I love you! That’s the problem!” He was fading, the brown of his clothes becoming gray, and fainter. She thought she could see love and pain and longing in his eyes, but he was leaving.
“Rap, wait!”
He shook his head, and spoke in a faint, distant voice. “Another clue: When do Nordlanders celebrate Winterfest?”
He had gone. She was alone in the cloister, and the yard was bare and naked under the frost of the winter morning. She began to move to the church door and then changed her mind. Shivering, she tugged her cloak tight about her and headed back to the palace.
6
Two days after Winterfest, the farewells began. The first to go was Shandie, heading off to stay with his aunt until spring came. His mother was rarely seen and he never spoke of her, but he was a much healthier, happier little boy than he had been during the regency. The Leesofts departed in a caravan of coaches. Others followed.
Kade and Inos began their own good-byes. There were many good-byes. A dozen young men swore they would come to Krasnegar on the first ship of spring. It would be heavy laden, Inos thought, and just as burdened when it returned.
Eigaze wept and ate chocolates. Her father was more restrained, but his political standing had not suffered by befriending Inos. He was heavily favored for the next consulship, and she was glad of that. Tiffy swore his heart was broken and he would resign from the hussars to become a priest. Inos made him promise to wait at least a week, confident that by then soft arms would have cushioned his fall.
Kadolan had a strange farewell with Sagorn and his companions. Inos skipped that one, as she knew neither the sage nor Jalon well. She had met Thinal not at all, and retained unhappy memories of the other two.
The imperor was gracious, and he had not presented a bill. What he had offered instead was a treaty between Krasnegar and the Impire, a pact of non-aggression. Inos found the idea amusing, but she also saw what the sly old man had seen sooner — however meaningless it might be in practice, such a document would give her authority if any of her subjects wanted to argue her claim. The text was brief and seemed harmless. Sagorn approved it for her; Emshandar chuckled and claimed that it was the only honest treaty he had ever signed.
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