by Melanie Rawn
The implied threat was an empty one, but Wordturner couldn’t know that. He blanched, and sweat broke out on his brow and upper lip. Cade knew well enough what that meant, and shoved him towards the door so someone could take care of him before he yarked all over the bed.
The shy gratitude in the blue eyes of Princess Miriuzca caught at his heart. She was so young, so gentle; should he warn her what sort of man Ashgar was, or let her find her own way?
“B-beholden,” she whispered.
Vrennerie was righting the sheets and counterpane. “We’ll look forward to meeting your father, Master Silversun.”
He realized his mistake. All he’d meant was to sneer some sense into Wordturner. She had understood his mention of his father to mean that Zekien could be relied upon as someone to trust.
Lady Panshilara suddenly clapped her hands and announced that the Princess would now retire. Her accent was atrocious, but her words were perfectly comprehensible as she added, directly at Cayden, “Alone in her bed, proved and witnessed, also—or would you like another look?”
The words could have been sarcasm from a highborn lady to a commoner; the look in her eyes was pure malevolence. The Princess cringed back into the pillows again, and Vrennerie’s fists clenched. Cade was no Jeska, able to swerve on a penny piece from one aspect to another. He could do nothing but shake his head and turn and leave the room.
Air. He needed air. The hallways were endless, the staircases packed with revelers, the noise deafening. Finally he got outside into the gardens through the simple method of climbing out a ground-floor window. He gulped in the cool breeze off the lake, walking aimlessly, staring up at the waxing moon. At length he found himself trudging along the path between looming hedge sculptures. When Mieka suddenly called his name, he nearly lost his footing.
“Have a drink, Quill.”
Settling on a bench beside the Elf, he took a glass and watched the light of a thousand torches from the gardens glitter on the wine.
“Past midnight yet, is it?” Mieka asked.
“They’ve been ringing all their bells all evening—who can tell?”
“Hmm. Well, for the sake of convenience, let’s say it is.”
“Did you hear any of that? In the Princess’s bedchamber, I mean.”
“I heard enough. Never thought Drevan would turn out such a snarge.” He emptied the bottle into his own glass. “Drunk, of course. And likely to have had quite a scold from His Grace, don’t you think?” He wasn’t looking at Cade, but back up towards the palace. At specific windows of the palace, Cade learned a few moments later when there was an awful bang! and a window shattered and smoke began to billow out. Mieka tilted back his head and roared with laughter.
“Gods Almighty!” Cade exclaimed. “What did you do?”
“It’s me Namingday, Quill, I had to celebrate!” he said, not bothering to deny responsibility. “Everybody else forgot, so it was up to me, wasn’t it?”
“I didn’t forget,” he protested, although he had. “But what did you do?”
“You ’member at the port, when all the ship cannons went off? Well, I sneaked meself down belowdecks later, with a flask or two of ale, y’unnerstand.” He grinned. “Nice young sailors in His Gracious Majesty’s service, that’s thirsty work. They were glad to tell me all about how to fire off a cannon without a cannonball in it. It’s the powder charge what makes it explode, so I palmed me one or three. Just for the pop.”
“But—”
“There’s a length of ropy stuff, and you light the end with a flint-rasp and wait for it to burn to the powder. They didn’t measure right, and that’s why the shots were off-timed in the harbor. I was worried I hadn’t used enough—had to make me getaway nice and safe, y’see.”
“But when did you do it? When did you have time to go back to our rooms and—”
He laughed and patted his pockets. “All the necessaries have been right here all night! Once Lady Vrennerie shooed everyone out, it was an easy run and nobody home. But I been waitin’ out here for half of forever.” He made a grand flourish of one arm and spilled half his drink. “Isn’t it brilliant?”
“Mieka,” he whispered, staring up at the smoke, “it’s on fire!”
“No, it ain’t. It’s a garderobe, silly. All tile and stone. Well, and a bit o’ glass.”
“You—you didn’t,” Cade breathed, not knowing whether to be more awed or appalled. “Where in the garderobe did you put it?”
“Right next the shithole!” He chortled and bumped Cade with a shoulder. “Not where anybody could piss on it—up under the porcelain seat, like, and then I had to think where to trail the rope so the smolder wouldn’t get wet either—”
A wonderful certainty came to Cade then, but to make absolutely sure he asked, “Whose garderobe?”
“The Archduke’s, of course.”
He had a sudden vision of the Archduke sliding through shit all over the floor. It was deeply satisfying.
He toasted the Elf with a heartfelt, “Happy Namingday, Mieka!”
Chapter 19
“Hells!” Mieka cried. “And I went to all that trouble, too!”
They found out the next day that the Archduke had not been in his suite when the powder charge went off in his garderobe. No one had been there, and a fortunate thing that was, too, for the pop! Mieka had expected not only blasted the seat to splinters and blew out the window but totally obliterated the bathtub as well. He had to be content with knowing the Archduke would be compelled to use somebody else’s facilities. It was that, or sit his noble posterior down on a piss-pot, just like common folk.
Mieka found this to be scant reward for all his careful work. Cade—who alone knew who was responsible—consoled him with, “Bear up, old son. Next time you’ll get it right. Shall we arrange for an unarranged stop at Prickspur’s this Winterly?”
That idea cheered him up considerably.
The morning after the wedding was the day of their departure, so there was no chance to celebrate Mieka’s Namingday. The summer weather had broken with showers in the morning, followed by lowering gray clouds that obscured the mountains. The Archduke, in his farewell speech, made some pretty remarks about how the skies themselves over the country wept with the leaving of their dearest lady—an unfortunate reference, for with his words some sunlight poked through the clouds. Mieka grinned.
The change in weather demonstrated why they’d come to collect the Princess now. Another few weeks, and late-summer rains would mire the roads, and even Mieka knew that autumn sailing could be dodgy. But the poor girl would have to wait many weeks before officially wedding Ashgar. A decree of a century or so ago meant that no underage girl was allowed to marry a Prince. Miriuzca had not yet turned eighteen. This law had come from a heartbroken (and, Mieka suspected, guilt-ridden) king whose adored bride of barely fifteen had died in childbed. The time until the new Princess’s Namingday this winter would be spent at the Keeps, where she would be further instructed in language, history, Court protocol, and religion. Then, because winter was a rotten time to hold public celebrations, the grand celebrations—including theater performances—would be held in the spring. Kearney Fairwalk was nervous that Touchstone would be disinvited to that, as well. Mieka didn’t bother his head about it. The Princess liked them. Granted, she couldn’t officially like them, because women weren’t supposed to attend the theater, but still, she did like them.
Between those performances and the present were long days of travel in a coach and on the ship, and then rehearsals and some bookings in Gallantrybanks, and then the Winterly Circuit. Mieka shrugged off thinking about all that as well. His immediate concern was to be home as fast as possible. He had no idea how far it was back to the port city, but didn’t really mind how many days in a coach were ahead of him. As long as he didn’t have to think of those water-things dragging the barges, he was fine.
Then he found out that Touchstone’s other performances had been canceled as well. They would be joining th
e selection of servants, travelling in coaches, who would arrive at the port before the new Princess to ready her shipboard quarters. She, the Archduke, and various representatives from Gallantrybanks, with their personal retinues, would be sailing the Vathis River, stopping at one minor and two major courts along the way. She was also keeping Briuly Blackpath with her.
“And the Lord and Lady alone know how long it will take us,” sighed Kearney Fairwalk as he finally thought to mention this, right when they were about to get into the coach.
“Do you mean to say,” Mieka asked in what he tried valiantly to make a normal tone of voice, “that we’ll be rushing crossland, overnight, for a week—”
“Nearly a fortnight, actually.”
“—then sit about with our thumbs up our noses while you dawdle?”
“Why aren’t you coming with us?” Jeska wanted to know.
“Oh, distant cousin of the King, delegate, all that sort of thing, don’t you see,” he answered calmly. “I’d rather join you, of course I would, but—”
“I don’t see,” Mieka snapped.
“C’mon,” Cade said, heading for the coach. “Let’s get the fuck out of here.”
Lady Vrennerie would naturally be sailing with the Princess, and Mieka thought this was the source of Cayden’s foul mood. He was only partially correct.
It was just the four of them in the coach, so they had room to stretch out if they liked. But they would also be sleeping here at least three nights and possibly five, depending on whether they made good time. There were no fold-down seats, as there were in Fairwalk’s personal carriage, only a pile of blankets. They had been relegated to their proper station in life. And Mieka knew who must be responsible.
In retrospect, he shouldn’t have used the powder charge on the man’s poor defenseless garderobe. He should’ve used it on him.
When, after the coach had been waved out of the palace grounds, he said so, the whole of the tale had to be told. Jeska was torn between admiration and horror. Cade, grinning, congratulated him again on his success at not being caught.
Rafe, after a complex chuckle of a snort, said, “I heard one of the servants talk of a fault in the plumbing. Nasty vapors and such. But somebody else whispered of magic.”
“But it wasn’t magic at all!” Mieka exclaimed.
“And then,” Rafe continued, “he said something about a Guild.”
“So we’ve failed,” Cade said slowly. “We were supposed to introduce these people to magic as used in theater, and instead it turned out a total cock-up and they’re more suspicious than ever. We denied the Archduke the purchase of us. And thus we made an enemy.”
“But friends in the Princess, and Lady Vrennerie,” Mieka countered.
“That’s as may be. Tell me, how much power will either of them ever possess at Court?”
Jeska gave him a shrewd smile. “Once the Princess has a son, quite a bit, don’t you think?”
“That’s at least a year away. And in the betweentimes we’re off on another Winterly, and if we’re not careful another after that.”
Rafe glanced over from staring out the window. “Are you trying to hack me off?”
“I’m setting out the facts. We’ll be paid well for this trip, but—”
“Not as much as if we’d played all the shows scheduled,” Rafe countered.
Cade actually grinned. “Half of it was banked before we left. What we lost by not playing doesn’t amount to the half we’re still owed. And I’ve an idea or two for making up some of the difference.”
“What’s your plan for your share of the money?” Mieka asked. “Me, I’m buying a house.”
Jeska’s smile turned wry. “Once you get her, you don’t want to lose her in that bloody great maze at Wistly?”
“If I get her,” he sulked, but bluethorn wouldn’t let him stay miserable for long. “Why can’t we just steal one of the ships and sail home ahead of everyone else?”
Cade had stopped breathing when Mieka mentioned a house, but it wasn’t the look of an Elsewhen. He was remembering one, Mieka knew it. But he didn’t ask.
“I plan to sell the old house and buy a cottage seaside for Mum,” Jeska said. “So she won’t have to work ever again.”
But why shouldn’t he ask? It was about him, he knew it was about him, why in all hells shouldn’t he—
“My parents wouldn’t know where to put themselves if they didn’t have to work the bakery anymore,” Rafe was saying. “But I think Mum would like to join Fa on his trips now and again, and if they hire two more apprentices, she’ll be able to travel with him.”
“If his trips are anything like this one, she’d best stay home,” Mieka told him. “I didn’t want to come along, and I was right. It’s been a fuckin’ disaster.”
“Not entirely—not for Cayden,” Rafe reminded him. “What news of the lovely Lady Vrennerie?”
Cade replied with a shrug, and stared out the window for the next hour. Mayhap Mieka had been right in the first place, and his moodiness was because of the girl.
Worst Namingday ever.
They slept, if one could term it that, in the coach that night. And the next night. They were allowed out five times each day: in the morning for breakfast, at noon for lunching, around five for tea, after dark for a late dinner, and—grudgingly—about midnight when the horses were changed yet again. That their liberation from the coach was entirely due to the horses, without any thought at all to their own comfort, was made obvious on the very first day: Rafe asked the driver to stop so he could get out and have a piss, and he was told to hold on to it for another three hours until the switch to another team of horses and another driver was made. Rafe responded by taking a cue from Mieka’s flouting of Winterly Circuit regulations, and relieved himself out the window.
By the third day, Rafe had had enough of trying to fold his big body into a bench seat, and demanded they stop at an inn. Mieka tugged the woolen cap down over his ears before he climbed out, and stepped into a pile of horseshit left in the yard, and thought seriously about maiming someone. Jeska, for preference, who fell about laughing as Mieka tried to scrape the slime from his boot.
“Shut it!” he snarled, and dug his hand into the mess, and threw a clod at the masquer. He missed. This infuriated him even more, and he went for Jeska with both fists.
When he woke up, draped across a wooden bench in the stable yard, Cade was approaching with a bucket of water. “You just never learn, do you? At least all your teeth are still there. Jeska must be mellowing in his old age.”
Mieka pushed himself upright and groaned. The only source of pain was his jaw, and it was further humiliation that Jeska had evidently felled him with a single contemptuous punch. He stuck both hands into the bucket to wash them, and opened his mouth to complain.
“For the love of the Gods and Angels, stop whining!” Cade snapped. “Haven’t I enough to worry about without listening to you snivel?”
Mieka didn’t speak to him, or anyone, for a whole day.
Finally they arrived back at the port town, and back on board their ship he immediately climbed up to the top bunk and got out his roll of thorn. The other coach, the one full of servants, was decanted onto the ship that would carry Princess Miriuzca to Gallantrybanks. They could clean it with a toothbrush or burn it to the waterline for all he cared. All that mattered to him was the paper twist marked in red, and the little glass thorn in its nest.
“Don’t even think about it,” said Cayden as he walked in the cabin door. “We’re rehearsing this evening.”
“For what?”
“The show we’re giving tomorrow night. They do have theater here, Mieka—well, not exactly a theater, more like a town banqueting hall for important feast days—but we’re performing.”
“Still wanting to show the yobbos what a real play looks and feels like? I thought we didn’t want to frighten them.”
“See my face?”
“You mean the ‘I don’t give a shit’ face? Fine
. Wake me when it’s time to go to this theater.”
The thorn roll was taken from his hands. “Get up. Do your job.”
He considered refusing. But Cade was indeed wearing a face, and there was a flash in his gray eyes, and anyway it would get him out of this cabin for a bit. Hells, it was something to do.
The “theater” Cade led them to had seen plays performed before. There was, in fact, a backstage full of costumes and scenery, none of it up to Mieka’s standards but, he supposed, serviceable enough for the kind of amateur theatrics people did at home. No magic involved, no intensity of sensation or emotion beyond what the actors brought to the piece. A few of these amateurs had gathered in the otherwise empty hall, and one of them gathered up the courage to approach Touchstone.
“We—would it be good if we watch?” His heavy accent made the words nearly unintelligible.
Cade loathed strangers at rehearsal. So Mieka blinked several times with surprise when he nodded and smiled, and gestured to the chairs stacked around the edges of the space.
“They’ll tell their friends,” he explained when Jeska asked. “Full houses for the next three nights.”
“Not much pay,” Rafe interpreted, “but plenty of trimmings.”
It was a relief to think about nothing except the staging, the timing. “Troll and Trull” wasn’t a demanding piece, but Mieka always enjoyed the silliness of it. He used the withies Cade had primed with just enough for a quick run-through, and even these hints of the full magic had their small audience gasping. Afterwards, one of them came up to him and reached out a shy finger to the glass twigs.
“Oy, let those be,” Mieka warned.
“I only—”
“Best do as he says,” Rafe drawled. “He hates anybody touching his toys. They loom large in his legend.”
Mieka stuck his tongue out at him.
That evening, Rafe and Jeska went out drinking. Cade stayed in the cabin with Mieka, and together they sampled a bit more of Auntie Brishen’s thorn. The packet they used was marked with black and green and a splotch of red. As Cade prepared the glass thorn and Mieka mixed the powder, they talked over the reactions of the evening.
