Sky of Swords

by Dave Duncan

  Astonished, she fell back a step before his fury. “Nothing! The fault was mine.” The last time she had ridden through Sycamore Square she had been cheered. That had been before the Wetshore Massacre. “You did right, Commander.”

  And even Dian had to admit that anything Malinda tried to do now would only make things worse. She had no authority. The minor clerks who had been left to run the palace and the country would neither make their own decisions nor take orders from her. Everything must wait for the Lord Protector.

  Awakening to the fact that her Blades were not merely downcast but also bedraggled and dung-spattered, Malinda sent for the court tailor. He arrived in a very few minutes—a dumpy, breathless little man whose life was one long despair because aristocratic clients expected instant service and indefinitely delayed payment. At his heels shuffled an army of underfed apprentices, bearing samples and swatches and tapes. He must have been hoping he would be engaged to replace the entire wardrobe Her Grace had lost to the Baels, for he made a poor job of hiding his disappointment when he learned she merely wanted four liveries in record time. He sent away half his minions and all the lace, velvets, and brocades they had brought with them.

  The matter was far from routine to the Blades, though. They preened as the remaining flunkies surrounded them and began measuring and scribbling notes.

  “My blazon, of course, is a lozenge vert, a lion rampant argent,” she said. “You are familiar with the green I prefer?”

  “Indeed yes, Your Highness. The deep forest tone? Accessories and minor garments—hose, shirts, footwear…?”

  “Whatever the Royal Guard gets.”

  “Then silk for the Commander?”

  Wrinkled woolen hose were a common sight on guardsmen. There were only eight legs in her troop and their owners were feeling very hangdog since the debacle in the market. “Silk for all of them. The best.”

  Avarice brightened the tailor’s eyes. “Then shirts and undergarments too…silver buckles…embossed calfskin…pearl buttons? Velvet for the cloaks? Even the Deputy Commander—”

  “I said the best! Spare no expense.”

  He bowed lower than she would have believed his girth permitted and began to make tactful inquiries about Her Highness’s personal needs.

  Shortly after that, while the disbelieving tailor was double-checking the measurements his apprentices had made on Sir Dog, in pranced a surprise visitor who was himself a dazzling sartorial spectacle.

  “Malinda, darling!” Arms wide, Prince Courtney advanced to embrace her, only to find himself blocked, looking up into the dark and stormy eyes of Sir Audley.

  “It’s all right, Commander. This is my cousin.”

  Audley stepped back out of the way and bowed. “My most humble apologies, Your Highness.”

  “Mm!” The little man looked him up and down with approval. “I know some persons who would be most interested to meet you, Commander.”

  “Your Highness is gracious!” But Audley’s manner belied the words, biting them off, making them sound like an insult.

  Courtney regarded the others. He minced around two tailors for a closer look at Abel. “And this handsome young lad?”

  “Not him either!”

  “Audley?” Malinda muttered, surprised at the sudden tension in the room. Nobody could consider Courtney a menace! A fop, yes, but harmless.

  “Well, do think about it,” her cousin said obscurely. “I can guide you away from some gentlefolk who have extreme tastes.” He eyed Dog thoughtfully. “Or to them. Malinda, darling! You did yourself proud at Ironhall, I see.”

  She allowed him to buss her cheek. Today he reeked of lavender. “I thought you were going back to Mayshire?”

  He waved his hands vaguely. “Well, you know how it is, my dear. One simply cannot tear oneself away from one’s old friends so easily.” If he was implying that he had been making the rounds of all the beds he had graced in the last quarter century, then the mind must reel. “And dear Granville might be offended if one was not here to welcome him.”

  She doubted that. She suspected Granville’s taste for Courtney would be much the same as her father’s—little and seldom.

  “I hear your brave guardians already proved their worth,” he said, and in a dramatic whisper, “Who is the one with the shoulders?”

  “Sir Dog. We did have some trouble. It was a tragic misunderstanding and I blame myself for—”

  “Oh, don’t ever do that, child! There will always be others willing to do that for you. Besides, peasants assaulting a princess of the blood? They got no more than they deserved. Your father would have had the Lord Mayor crawling into the palace on his knees offering cart loads of gold in recompense. Don’t worry about it.”

  “That’s very kind of you to say so.”

  “They got their comeuppance now, anyway,” her cousin said with a smirk. His eyes kept wandering toward her Blades. “The slender one?”

  “Sir Abel. What do you mean by comeuppance?”

  “A mob, darling. Shouting rude things outside the gates. The cavalry has just dispersed them and I fancy this time they got a lesson they will remember. Well, I must fly.”

  Courtney swept off into the palace labyrinth. Malinda wandered over to the window and stared out at stable rooftops, wondering what faceless flunky in the Household Yeomen or the Chamberlain’s office had ordered out the cavalry, how many more people had been hurt. She would probably be blamed for this disaster also, and she certainly blamed herself. Blades were dangerous weapons; she had acquired four of them by dubious means and failed to keep them under control.

  “Sir Audley?” she said without turning, and when he reached her side, “you took offense at something Prince Courtney said.”

  “I humbly beg pardon, Your Grace. I will attempt in future—”

  “No, I want to know why. His words seemed innocent enough. I thought he was offering to introduce you to rich ladies, and I suppose you prefer to make your own friends, but…No?”

  Audley muttered, “Not ladies, Your Grace.”

  She continued to scan those roofs industriously. “Sorry, but you’ll have to explain.”

  “Er…They warned us at Ironhall that there were ways a Blade could make extra money at court, Your Grace. Ladies, obviously, but…other persons, too. Your cousin was mentioned.”

  “You were warned against Courtney?”

  “Specifically, Your Grace.”

  “I thought he was a…a ladies’ man.”

  “That too, Your Grace. He has friends who aren’t—all sorts of friends, they said.”

  She sighed. “I have a lot to learn.”

  “So do we,” Audley growled, “but none of us four wants lessons of that sort. If we did, we could have had them at Ironhall.”

  Spirits! The world grew stranger every day.

  The first forest-green-and-white liveries were delivered before nightfall, with cloaks and footwear promised for the next day. They effected a very dramatic improvement in her Blades’ appearance. Dian faked a swoon into Sir Audley’s arms. Malinda was tempted to try that move herself. Four swoons, in fact. Well, three. Dog still had a rumpled look, like a dressed-up bear, but Dog would not shine in polished armor. He had been much more impressive just sitting on the anvil with his shirt off.

  Later Sir Dominic came calling and Malinda proudly presented the members of her Guard, all of whom had been long after his time in Ironhall, of course. If he thought her taste in livery extravagant, he was too polite to say so. “Looks like you did much better than I feared you would, my lady, because Grand Master’s reports read like a postmortem. Now, any swordsman needs regular practice, so I propose that we spell off your guardsmen during the night. My men will pledge solemn oaths to defend you as if you were their own ward…which you practically are. And of course we can take them two at a time so that you will never be without—”

  “No!” Audley looked appalled. So did Abel and Winter, while Dog just glowered and fingered his sword hilt.

/>   Dominic grinned. “You also have to learn your way around the palace, Commander, and learn more about court in general.”

  Although visibly flattered at being given his title, Audley still hesitated. “Perhaps in a month or two.”

  “I think the matter is urgent,” Malinda said. “I do not wish to be defended by second-rate swordsmen. Besides, everyone needs recreation. Commander Dominic, you will see they have some time to enjoy themselves?”

  “We can show them around. Do you suppose they prefer girls tall or short, lithe or chubby, shy or passionate, willing, eager, fond, frantic, or feverish?”

  The Princess’s Blades exchanged glances. Then Audley said, “If Her Highness issues a direct order…”

  A couple of days later, she asked him if he had been shown around the palace yet and was both amused and annoyed by the guarded way in which he said, “Yes, my lady.”

  “Greymere is a very old building.”

  “Indeed it is. Bewildering.”

  “And riddled with secret passages.”

  “Oh?”

  These were not the quarters from which Snake had abducted her on the Night of Dogs. “Is there a secret way into my bedchamber?”

  “Um…I promised…” The bold Sir Audley cringed like a child caught stealing muffins.

  “You also swore on your soul to shield me from peril. Suppose assassins come in that way?”

  “No one could possibly enter that way. It leads to rooms reserved for the Royal Guard.”

  “Then suppose the murderers come for me through the front door, slaughtering the Blades on duty there, how can I flee through an exit I cannot locate?”

  Audley by now was scarlet-faced, yet he had his heels well dug in. “The Guard hoards these secrets because the fewer people who know about them the better, Your Grace. Greymere was built by Ambrose the First a hundred years ago, and this suite was his personal apartment. He had a private staircase down to what was then more sleeping quarters, and the heraldry displayed in the cornices is that of Countess Blanche, his famous—”

  “Notorious.”

  “Notorious, um…”

  “Mistress.”

  “Friend. But now the chamber is a dressing room off the Guard’s fencing gymnasium.”

  “Fascinating! Good memory!” When she drew herself up, she was as tall as he was. “Show me.”

  He followed her into the bedroom, but by then he had found another excuse. “I promised Leader, Your Grace. If he learns that I broke my word, he’ll never trust me again. I can’t carry out my duties without the cooperation of the Guard.”

  “That’s fair enough,” she conceded. There was no use driving the man into open rebellion. “You show me how it opens at this end, and I will never tell anyone else, nor will I let the Guard find out I know about it.”

  Reluctantly accepting this compromise, Audley went to a pilaster between the fireplace and the window. “What they said was…” He gave the fake pillar a hard shove to the left. When nothing happened he tried it the other way and then it moved just far enough to reveal a handhold in the wall. A tug on that made a section of the paneling swing out, exposing steps leading downward. “There!”

  “Thank you, Commander.” She walked away. He was beautiful when he was mad.

  Another result of the midnight study sessions showed up the following morning, as she was preparing to leave her apartment. She overheard Dian saying, “Ooh, isn’t that gorgeous!”

  Malinda looked around. Young Sir Abel had his hands behind his back and was in the process of turning scarlet.

  “Isn’t what gorgeous?”

  Audley glared at his subordinate. “A bauble, my lady. The Guard allows them, but if you find personal display offensive, I can forbid it while he’s on duty.”

  “That depends what he’s displaying. Show us, Sir Abel.”

  With a grimace worthy of a well-used torture victim, Abel held out his hand to show a ring bearing a spectacular pearl. It was an unusual pink shade, and must be worth more than he would earn in a lifetime. Malinda wondered if any of Cousin Courtney’s friends were involved.

  “Gorgeous!” she said. “What an unusual color!”

  “Exactly matches his ears,” Dian remarked.

  “He must have worked very hard to earn that!” said Dog.

  “The lady is generous,” said Winter.

  “Not necessarily,” Audley suggested. “She may be quite stingy. Depends how good he is.”

  Abel, needless to say, was now ready to die of mortification.

  “If he wants to wear it, Commander,” Malinda said, “then I certainly have no objection.” All her life she had seen Blades flaunting such trinkets; they had even joked about them in her presence as if she would not guess what they meant.

  “He should not display it near you, Your Grace,” Audley said, heading for the door.

  “Why not?”

  “Because he swore to shield you from pearl.”

  “Please let me kill him,” Dog growled.

  Malinda led out her private army, well pleased with its progress to date.

  21

  Only the unloved sleep alone.

  BARONESS DECHAISE (LADY VIOLET)

  As a bubble-thin crescent in the sunset proclaimed the first day of Fourthmoon, the Lord Protector, Granville Fitzambrose, Earl of Thencaster, rode into Grandon behind the mounted band of the Household Yeomen. He was escorted by a battalion of cavalry from his army of Wylderland, because the detachment of the Royal Guard that had ridden north to meet him he had immediately sent home again. Behind him rode members of the Council, including Lord Chancellor Roland. The hero was welcomed at the city limits by the Lord Mayor, the aldermen, and many senior peers of the realm. The inhabitants of the capital roared their hearts out, strewing flowers, blowing trumpets, beating drums.

  Malinda had been advised that she would head the reception committee at the palace. Amby was kept indoors to watch the bands through a window, but the heralds placed her in full view at the top of the steps. This was undoubtedly intended to signify that she waived her right to be regent as set out in the Act of Succession. No one had yet suggested that she should do otherwise.

  The heralds had reluctantly allowed space at her back for two Blades. One of them had to be Audley, and she had let the others draw lots. Dog had won, which was a pity, because no amount of primping could ever make him look elegant and putting him next to the stunningly handsome Audley just drew attention to his incorrigible ugliness. His flaxen hair appeared soiled against the snowy lace at his neck and the osprey plumes fringing his bonnet; the plumes themselves seemed to have wilted in despair. But who was she to criticize appearances? She was flanked on one side by Courtney and on the other by the ancient Baron Dechaise, First Lord of the Treasury, and she was a foot taller than either of them.

  When the Lord Protector came striding up the steps, she sank into a full curtsey. He went right by the entire reception party, spurs jingling. The Council necessarily followed.

  She rose, feeling her face flame at the snub. The reception committee buzzed with angry whispers. Even Courtney straightened out of his bow looking furious, and she could not recall ever seeing him reveal his true feelings before.

  “The politics have started,” she said.

  “They never stopped, darling. I think I shall interpret that incident as permission to leave court.”

  She went to call on Amby and was refused entry because the Lord Protector was within, paying his respects to the King. She returned to her suite to wait for his summons.

  Since her journey to Ironhall she had assembled a new household. She was still attended by the rabbity Ruby and the bovine Dove, but she had sent invitations to others and had now acquired two maids of honor whom she knew of old and whose company she enjoyed, Alys and Laraine. Both of them were about her own age, and skilled players on the spinet. She had persuaded Mother Superior to assign Sister Moment to her household—Moment was tiny, vivacious, and a superb lutist. Thus singing
and dancing were available without bringing in outsiders. Add Dian and four dapper Blades and evenings in her suite could become entertaining to the brink of hysteria. What happened after curfew she preferred not to know, but Dove made cow eyes at Winter from dawn till dusk. It would not be like a Blade to refuse such an appeal.

  That night her household was edgy, being well aware that snubs that would be mere rudeness elsewhere could be deadly at court. Lady Malinda was now a leper until the Lord Protector indicated otherwise. Dog again offered to kill Granville, causing Audley to rant at him and Lady Ruby to shriek in horror. As the hours passed it became obvious that no summons was coming. Eventually Malinda declared the day over, but she snarled at Dian during their regular bedtime chat.

  She dozed for an hour or so, then came awake with a start. What was Granville planning? Why cut her in public like that? Was she to be charged with treason for her father’s death? Embezzlement for stealing four Blades? Murder in Sycamore Square? In the gloom of the night her worries multiplied like ants in a pantry.

  Eventually she rose. Donning slippers and a fleecy robe, she went to stare out the window at the stars above the darkened city. She was tempted to pace, except that the old floors might squeak…and that thought reminded her of the secret stair. The temptation was too great to resist. She had no lantern, but she did not need light to slide the pilaster aside and pull on the panel. How many of her forebears had opened this door in breathless eagerness, hurrying to visit a paramour? Shivering in the night chill, she faced nothing but blackness.

  Remembering having seen a handrail on the fireplace side, she groped for it and then let one slipper explore the edge of the first step. Four steps brought her to a corner; the rail turned to the left. Her toes established that the stair continued along the back of the chimney. Eight or ten more steps brought her to another sharp corner to the left, meaning she had gone halfway around the chimney column and was now facing her bedroom again, albeit below floor level. One of the curses of Greymere was the rooms could never be properly warmed in winter because the ceilings were thirty feet high, so obviously this stair must go down a long way. She had come far enough. Suppose she twisted an ankle?