"Strike, Estmere! We have it now!"
He was more daring than I. Eyes bright as blue fire in his new strength, my brother dodged in past the remaining arm, swung his sword with barbaric force, and cut the legs right out from under the anfoniad. As the thing fell, trying to catch us beneath it, we harried it as dogs do a bear, springing in and out, cutting at it. And each time a lump of earth fell away, it melted neatly down into the ground.
But the Sending refused to surrender. That was the worst of it, that the anfoniad made no attempt to protect itself. Even as we hacked at it, it continued its mindless efforts to kill us. And I felt the first prickles of unease. At the back of my mind had been the fear that the Earth-strength would burn at us till we died of it. Now I realized that our merely mortal bodies simply couldn't hold it; the wild Power was rapidly draining away. And as soon as it was gone, the sorcerer would rebuilt his Sending—
The sorcerer! Duwies glân, I was missing the real target! Though his body might have been who knew how far away, the sorcerer still had to have his mind, his essence, focused here in his muddy creation.
Gathering the last of the Earth-force within me, I felt the center of that focus, and knew exactly what to do.
Estmere glanced at me aghast as I gave what must have been a truly savage smile and lunged at the anfoniad with all the strength within me. My sword pierced right through the Sending's chest—and the sorcerer had no chance to pull his mind free.
The impact of such a blow, Faerie metal stabbing human essence, must have been agonizing. I caught one distant psychic scream of pure anguish—
Then the anfoniad sank in on itself into a formless mound of mud. In less time than it takes to tell this, it was gone, dissolved back into the ground. And only the earth torn by our feet proved that there had been a battle at all.
For a long while Estmere and I just stood, swaying with exhaustion and struggling to breathe regularly as the last of the Earth-strength drained from our bodies. But as soon as he had managed to draw in sufficient air, my brother, not surprisingly, began stammering questions.
"What—who—"
I told him what I could. He stared.
"Estmere?"
"I'm all right. I only—do you really live like this, Aidan?"
I laughed weakly. "Hardly. This is a little out of the ordinary even for a magician."
"But that . . . anfoniad . . ." He pronounced the word gingerly. "Our bird-spy sorcerer sent it? Why? It seems an overelaborate attempt at assassination."
"It wasn't meant as one."
"What then? A test? Was he testing your powers?"
I nodded, and my brother blinked in confusion.
"But you didn't use—I mean—surely you could have cast a spell to melt the thing."
"No. That was the true test. The anfoniad was built to be impervious to magic. Had I tried like some frightened novice to use Power against it, that Power would have recoiled on us both: fatally."
For a moment Estmere continued to stare. Then, quite reverently, he crossed himself. Still, kings are made of stern stuff. His next question was a controlled, "Was the sorcerer working on his own?"
"Out of simple professional jealousy, you mean? Not likely! Between the drawing of the Rune," which, I was beginning to realize, could only have been done from afar, a miserably difficult task which explained the Rime's sloppy design, "and the summoning of the anfoniad, our sorcerous friend used up a dangerous amount of inner energy. You don't risk your mind and body out of casual dislike for a stranger!"
"Then you're saying he was in someone else's employ. Can't you tell who that someone else might be?"
I mentally reviewed the list of all those nobles who had tried to use me. Aldingar? No. And no for any of the others, too. None of them would ever have dared (or, for that matter, have known how) to hire a foreign sorcerer. "I was rather hoping you could tell me."
Estmere sighed. "I have a good many foes. Not all of them open about it." He raised a quizzical brow. "You are sure he wasn't after you?"
"Sorry. I'm not involved in any arcane feuds." I grinned fiercely. "At least we won't have to worry about any new sorceries from him for a long time. If he even survived." Quickly I explained to Estmere what I had done, stabbing the sorcerer's essence through with the innately magical Faerie blade. He thought about it, winced, then echoed my grin.
"My, you magicians do play nasty games! I fear I can't pity him, though." He bit back a sudden yawn. "Dear Lord, but I'm weary."
"What would you expect? We'll both sleep like the dead tonight, which is a hundred times better than with the dead, and—now what?"
Estmere, red-faced, was biting his lip, quivering.
"All right, fy brawd, what's so funny?"
He exploded into laughter. "Y-you!"
"Estmere?"
"I—I didn't have a chance—didn't truly look at you! You—you look like you've been wallowing in mud!"
Which was, after all, pretty much what I'd been doing. "Now, really. A little mud—"
That started him off anew. "A little mud!"
It was a delayed reaction, of course, from our ordeal. I knew that. I tried to control myself, really I did. But he would go on laughing.
I don't even think he knew that little burst of will (and "little" was all I could have managed just then) came from me.
But that is why, when our party finally located us, they found His Most Gracious Majesty, King Estmere II, still laughing his royal head off. And sitting, most satisfactorily, in a nice, thick puddle of mud.
CHAPTER XII
HIRAETH
I slouched in a chair in my tower rooms, head in hands, struggling with the magical backlash of a failed spell: Power unspent recoils upon the sender. Fortunately for me, I had cast only a relatively mild Spell of Searching, nothing to endanger life or mind, but the headache its failure left behind was real enough.
Just when I'd managed to work enough restorative magic on myself to reduce the pain to a dull ache, there came a timid rapping on my chamber door.
"Go away," I muttered, but whoever was out there either didn't hear me or was under stronger orders than mine, because the tapping came again, a little more insistent this time. "Enough," I yelled (and, wincing, wished I hadn't), "I hear you," and released the Signs that had been guarding the door. "Enter."
It was Arn, the little page whose life I had saved, now totally restored to bright young health and still ablaze with hero worship, bearing a message from Estmere:
"His Majesty, your royal brother, fain would speak with you in his chambers."
A royal summons was the last thing I wanted to deal with right now, but, "So be it," I said, and went to splash cold water on my face and hopefully make myself look halfway human again.
A stray ray of sunlight had found its way through the narrow windows into the royal chambers, sparking tapestries into jewel-bright life, glinting dazzlingly off the intricate pattern of the tiled floor, brightening my brother's hair to brilliant gold. A pretty sight, but after the trip I'd made down from my tower, across the breadth of the palace—having to stop and acknowledge various polite and politic salutations along the way—and up again to this elegant maze of rooms, my headache had returned and I was totally out of breath.
Whatever Estmere had been going to say went unsaid as he stared me.
"God's blood, man, you look dreadful!"
So much for trying to look presentable. I shrugged, but Estmere persisted, "Are you ill?"
"Just tired."
"Come, sit."
As I gratefully obeyed, sinking to the high-backed, square-sided chair that was a twin to his own and once again willing my headache away, Estmere signalled to one of the omnipresent servants, who shyly presented me with a hastily filled goblet. When I hesitated, expecting the abysmal court wine (which, I was convinced, was in fashion more for its imported expense than its sediment-ridden flavor), my brother grinned.
"Mead, Aidan. You've corrupted my taste."
As I sipped appreciatively, feeling the golden warmth steal soothingly through me, I felt Estmere studying me.
"You're not still trying to learn who sent the anfoniad?"
"I am. With crystal and mirror and smoke—"
"You had half the court convinced your tower was on fire with that last one. Give it up."
"No."
"Yes. Aidan, it's been nearly three months! I've had
my spies out, too, and no one has found anything more than petty feuds and quarrels—the usual things, with not a trace of magic to them."
When I stared down into my goblet and said nothing, Estmere continued cajolingly, "Come now, brother. The sorcerer probably did die with his sorcery."
"Perhaps."
Suddenly I couldn't bear to sit still any longer. Putting my goblet down on the small table between our chairs, I got to my feet and moved to a window, courtiers and servants hurrying out of my way, and stood looking restlessly down through the narrow slit to where the broad Taemese gleamed like polished silver below the castle walls, thinking absently that though it was full summer down there, up here behind this heavy stone it was eternally dim, cool, timeless. After a moment I heard a flurry of motion—Estmere dismissing everyone—and the click of a door being quietly shut. Then my brother was at my side.
"What is the matter with you?"
I sighed. "Nothing. Nothing you can mend."
I wasn't about to tell him I was aching with hiraeth, that soft, sad homesick longing. I couldn't tell him about Ailanna.
Ailanna. Duwies glân, I was sick of dreams and visions! I ached to hold a warm, tangible, living Ailanna in my arms, to make a home for us amid the forest of my own land. . . .
My own land. What a sweet phrase that was, enough to fill me with bittersweet pain, with unease—
Unease?
There was an almost visible aura of nervousness in the air about us, and it certainly wasn't from me. I banished my brooding, all at once remembering that my brother must have had a good reason for summoning me. Estmere was usually quite respectful of my privacy, even though (since he accepted rooms crowded with courtiers as the norm) he still didn't quite understand it.
"What is it, Estmere? What's wrong?"
His fair skin flushed with embarrassment. "I . . . you've been here a year now."
"Yes." Suddenly I was wary, wondering.
"I think the people have accepted you."
What was he trying to tell me? I shrugged. "Up to a point. Despite the occasional uneasy soul who makes signs against magic when he thinks I'm not looking. And of course people come to me for healing. Even if they sometimes expect miracles: love potions, elixirs of immortality—Estmere what is the matter?" Had some of those nobles I'd rejected been speaking out against me? Or, instead of nobles, had it been priests? I'd thought Father Ansel and I had come to an understanding, but . . . "Planning to get rid of me?"
"Good Lord, no! Did you think? No. I . . ." He muttered something unregal under his breath, reddening even more. "I admit this sounds foolish, but, do you think I'm doing a proper job?"
"As king?"
He snorted. "Of course as king!"
"Mm. You've kept the markets open, the borders peaceful, and the nobles from each others' throats. I'm not an expert at politics, y Duwies be praised, but that sounds successful enough to me. Why the self-doubts?"
"I . . . oh, dammit all! You know that I'm betrothed."
"To be married?" I squawked like an idiot. "No, I didn't know, you never mentioned—who is she? Where did you meet her?"
"Aidan, you romantic, I've never met her. I've been betrothed since I was a babe in the cradle. It's standard royal practice; surely you knew that." He paused. "No. I can see you didn't. My dear, innocent brother, all kings must marry and produce heirs as quickly as possible. So, the sooner the problem of finding a suitable wife can be concluded, the happier everyone is."
"And of course romance doesn't enter into it."
"How could it?" He wouldn't meet my glance. "This is strictly a business proposition."
"Indeed. Then why are you so nervous?"
Estmere forced a laugh. "Not nervous: terrified. All these years I put the thought of my betrothal out of my mind, so successfully I frankly never realized you didn't know about it."
"But now the date for concluding this 'business proposition' is suddenly closer than you'd expected."
"The years do have a way of passing, don't they?" Estmere let out his breath in a long sigh. "I know I'm a decent ruler. I should be: I've been in training for the job all my life! But now this . . . I . . ."
He stopped awkwardly, that embarrassed and embarrassing flush returning, and I remembered how uncomfortable these more . . . modern folk were with thoughts of mating. Fighting down the bawdy, honest Cymraen jests that sprang to mind, I asked delicately, "But now you're worried about being a good husband as well? Estmere, you will be! I saw the envy on your face when we visited Lord Osmarc and his wife."
Something wistful flickered in Estmere's eyes. "Yes, but theirs was that rare thing, a true love match, not something arranged to seal a treaty or consolidate a royal—Ah, Aidan. I shouldn't be bothering you with this. You folk of the older faith probably look on our arranged marriages as immoral. But . . . I just can't go to anyone else. If I did, my fears would be all over the court by morning."
Well, I did think it immoral. But I wasn't defending it, I argued with myself, I was defending my brother. "Think, fy brawd. Your parents' marriage was an arranged one, wasn't it?"
"Of course."
"But you just told me there was more than mere royal duty between them. Despite all burdens, they truly loved each other, didn't they?"
"Oh, yes."
"Well? If such a wonder can happen once, who is there to say it can't happen again?"
He stared, laughed, stared again. In a voice quivering with the beginning of hope, my brother said hesitantly, "It could . . . she's kin, after all, not a total stranger . . . if I work at . . ." He stopped, then began again, almost defiantly, "Yes, of course it could happen. And it shall, God willing."
I smiled, and Estmere grinned in return. "Thank you for your counsel, brother," he began formally, then exploded, "By my faith, you make me look a fool!"
"No. Merely human."
"Don't belittle yourself. Look you, if I had been naive enough to go to anyone else, what do you think I'd have heard? Nothing but cold lectures on duty and obligation to my face, and mockery behind my back. But in a few simple words you set my mind at ease!" His grin widened. "Were I some tyrant of old, I swear I would keep you in a gilded prison as my most precious counselor—oh, don't give me that terrified glance! I'm only joking." Estmere threw a companionable arm across my shoulders. "You didn't think I'd ever do anything to hurt you, did you? Still, I do need you at my side, brother, surely you know that. There are times when I wonder how I ever managed without your good, plain common sense."
I pulled away before he could feel me wince.
Why had he said that? Why, when my heart ached with longing for my lady, my home, had he reminded me of my vow? It had been meant so kindly. But I felt the bonds of friendship, of my vow, come tightly about me like the strands of some gentle, unbreakable web. And for a moment I just couldn't bear to meet his hopeful gaze.
Eh, wait . . . a wife. What if she proved to be a true partner and friend to Estmere? It could happen. It happened all the time in Cymra. (My mind raced blithely over the fact that those were never arranged marriages.) And if Estmere had such a lady at his side, why then, surely my vow would be fulfilled!
My mind all at once was full of such happy pictures of Estmere and his love, of me and mine, that I nearly laughed aloud.
"Aidan? What's so amusing?"
"Never mind, never mind. Do I have to bespell you, brawd, or are you going to satisfy my curiosity on your own?"
"About?"
"Come now, Estmere! I think I'm entided to know the name of my sister-in-law-to-be!"
&nbs
p; He laughed. "Of course. After all, she's your kin, too, our . . . let me see . . . third cousin on our father's side, the last eligible female left in the direct royal line: the Duchess Clarissa."
The Duchess Clarissa, I echoed in silent dismay. The name and tide together put me in mind of some sour-faced old dowager.
I couldn't have been more mistaken.
CHAPTER XIII
ROYAL WEDDING
Och, the excitement that gripped the royal court as the wedding grew nigh! Each day the courtyard was crowded all over again with arriving guests, both Estmere's vassals and emissaries from other kingdoms. In one morning alone I counted nearly twenty nobles alighting from sleek, fidgeting horses or elegant carriages gleaming with fresh paint (elegant to the eye, that is, rough, jouncing torment to spine and seat), ten minstrels, two whole troops of acrobats, thirty musicians and their lutes, horns and tabors, and even one man with a dancing bear. All of them seemed determined to occupy that rapidly diminishing courtyard space at the same time, and all of them seemed equally determined to be the only ones seen and heard, crowding the air as they crowded the courtyard with a jangle of human noise and animal noise, pomander scent and sweat.
Nor was it any calmer within the palace. Everywhere I went, I found new and increasingly frantic activity. The guards were rapidly going gray with worry over checking everyone's credentials, while the courtiers were in their glory, making lists and gossiping over whdo outranked whom, who should sit above the salt at the wedding feast, in those more honorable places nearer the king, and who weren't so important and must sit below.
As if this wasn't confusing enough, both guards and courtiers were constantly being tripped up by the royal milliners, who were working apace to fill every available space with bright new banners showing the golden eagle of the royal household clasping the three white roses of Clarissa's family device. Where banners wouldn't fit, they crammed in smaller, eye-dazzlingly bright hangings and draperies and what seemed like acres of ribbons.
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