Baron Estobate’s men did not enter. He left them erecting tents and making camp on the slope below the walls while he rode inward alone. Dismounting before his sovereign, he stood scowling as servants led his horse to the stables. Then he proffered a brusque bow. “In the rain, Your Majesty?” he demanded, a man affronted to be greeted thus exposed—or perhaps discomfited by her willingness to stand humbly among the elements.
“For one of my barons?” she replied in a tone that affected fondness. “I have done as much for Baron Panderman. I will do so much and more for you, my lord Baron.”
Now visibly uncomfortable, he performed a second bow, one considerably improved. “Then, Your Majesty,” he growled in return, “I must encourage you to seek shelter. Such weather is unkind to women.”
Still fondly, she countered, “Yet what of your men, my lord Baron? They will find no relief from the coming storms in their rude camp, and surely no pleasure also. I would welcome all to my festivities. May I not welcome them as well?”
Hearing her, my ears fairly burned. She invited armed and armored men—surely the Baron’s advance force—into her house? Where they would have the freedom to betray her hospitality at any word from their lord? With stealth, they might contrive to unbar the gates, thereby at a stroke rendering moot the Domicile’s arduously prepared defenses. Yet Inimica Phlegathon deVry offered her welcome as though neither Glare Estobate nor any conceivable army wielded power sufficient to disturb her composure.
For his part, the Baron’s eyes appeared to bulge in his head, and his jaw dropped. When he forced his mouth to close, I imagined that I heard the grinding of his teeth. To his sovereign’s gracious smile he returned only silence for some moments. When he spoke at last, it was with the sound of a man humiliated—and denied satisfaction.
“My men,” he announced, “will do very well where they are. Their purpose here is to watch over the tranquility of Your Majesty’s ball. I will not alter their duties, or transgress upon your kindness, by housing them within your walls.”
He may have feared that they would be murdered in the privacy of their bedchambers. Or perhaps he merely felt unmanned by my Queen’s impenetrable intentions. In either case, he plainly saw the folly of attempting to match wits with her. Having declared himself, he sealed his mouth. As soon as she conceded with a promising sweetness, “As you wish, my lord Baron,” he strode past her to enter the house, leaving her to follow or remain at her pleasure.
Ere she left the courtyard, she cast a glance directly at my vantage some levels above her—gazed toward me as though she had known from the first that I stood witness. Distinctly she nodded like a woman who had fixed my fate in her mind. Then she passed beyond my sight, returning to the shelter and warmth of her home.
Well, then. My Queen had often commanded me to overhear her private encounters. I chose therefore to believe that she approved my presence now. Were I mistaken, I could do naught to unmake my error.
For an hour thereafter, the drizzle became a downpour, a deluge freed from the storm’s earlier restraint. When the rains had pummeled the Domicile for a time, however, apparently seeking to damage the very flag-stones of the bailey, the dark seethe overhead parted strangely, allowing the sun to shed its beneficence over the house once more. To left and right, south and north, fierce rainfall streaked golden by sunshine still beat upon the slopes and hills, yet above us stretched a swath of the sky’s clearest azure.
Almost at once, vapors began to coil and sway upward from the drenched stones. They rose in questing tendrils and wreaths until the sun dismissed them. And through these mists came riding Thrysus Indolent, last to arrive of the barons.
He had the air of man who had never in life felt the touch of rain or discomfort. Even the hair of his uncovered head appeared undampened.
He entered the courtyard accompanied by no other entourage than half a dozen seeming bodyguards. They were plain-clad men heavy of arm and wary of eye, with sabers at their hips and dirks at their belts. No insignia—indeed, no form of livery—marked their station. Yet their formation around the Baron made manifest their purpose.
As my Queen strode forward to give greeting, parting the mists by her presence, Thrysus Indolent and his men dismounted in near-flawless unison. With the efficiency of much practice, the men delivered their horses to the Domicile’s ostlers. Only then did their formation open so that Baron Indolent could emerge to meet his sovereign.
To Her Majesty’s welcome—as warm as any, and as impervious to bafflement or insult—the Baron replied with an elegant and apparently gratified bow that nonetheless conveyed a suggestion of mockery. “Your Majesty,” he declaimed, “I have come eagerly to your ball, anticipating much of pleasure, and more of interest. I hope that you will indulge an exposed man’s caution by extending the hospitality of your house to include my companions.”
Ere she answered, she gazed at each of his bodyguards in turn as though committing their visages to memory. Then she said, “They are most certainly welcome to enter my house and attend my ball, my lord Baron.” After a brief pause to emphasize her words, she added, “Provided that they attire and comport themselves as guests rather than as ruffians.”
To this, he returned an easy chuckle. “They will surely do so, Your Majesty. Indeed, they have come both prepared and strenuously instructed to do so.” He, too, paused for emphasis. “However, they will not set aside their weapons. Speaking freely, Your Majesty, I confess that I fear harm to my person.” His manner did not suggest fear. “Certainly not from any member of your household,” he assured her. “Your hospitality has ever been immaculate, a comfort to even the most timid of your subjects. Yet I have been made aware that Jakob Plinth is wroth with me. As for Glare Estobate, he is at all times wroth with everyone. And Praylix Venery is readily misled by false counsel. I am discomfited by the prospect of a blade in my back while I enjoy your festivities.”
My Queen nodded as though she had expected some such peroration. “Then be at ease, my lord Baron,” she replied. “Your companions have my leave to retain their weapons. This ball and its pleasures are mine”—she stressed the word slightly—“and I will countenance no harm to any of my guests.”
There Baron Indolent proffered a second bow deeper than the first. “You are at all times the very model of graciousness, Your Majesty.”
So saying, he nodded to his nominal companions. Bowing in their turn, they resumed their formation around their master as he led them, positively bristling with delight, past his sovereign into her house.
At his back, thunderheads closed above the Domicile once more. The rains resumed their vehemence. Distant thunders growled in the east, promising lightnings that were for the present blocked from sight by the high roofs of my Queen’s habitation. To my mind, they announced that the crisis of Inimica Phlegathon deVry’s efforts to preserve her realm had now truly begun.
Much of the afternoon was spent in a mad rush of activity that I did not trouble myself to observe. Fleeing for shelter beneath the rainfall, more guests arrived in great numbers. Respected merchants, large landholders, prosperous fishmongers, notable mine and timber mill overseers, and no small count of their less recognizable relations entered the house, bringing with them every marriageable maiden and eligible bachelor to whom they could lay claim. And for this multitude, the multitude of my Queen’s servants scrambled to provide attendance. Cooks, serving-men, and chamber-maids were run off their feet. Much care was required for the finery of the guests, and much effort for their refreshment. Indeed, some fools had set out from their homes already clad in their most splendid attire, and for them the laundries and clothes-presses and seamstresses labored double to repair the soilure of travel in forbidding weather.
Of all this flurry and even desperation I was aware, albeit indirectly, yet I gave it no heed. Having repaired to my laborium, where quiet reigned despite the storms and frenzy above me, I donned my assigned livery,
concealed my pouch of chrism and my hieronomer’s blade within the hauberk, and hefted my unwieldy halberd. With my Queen’s heraldry bright on my chest, I practiced pacing my floors in a grave, unhurried manner—practiced, that is, managing my halberd without either tripping my own feet or harming those guests who would soon surround me. At intervals, I confirmed that my pouch and blade had not shifted inconveniently in their coverts. And when I had achieved a modest confidence that I would not fail Her Majesty through plain blunder, I departed my chambers to seek some vantage among the Domicile’s secret passages.
By my reckoning, my Queen’s call would not summon her guests to feasting for another hour. The ball itself would not commence until two further hours had passed. First, therefore, I sought some forgotten spyhole which would permit me to observe one party of guests or another in their last preparations. Thereafter, having no place at the feast, where all the guests in their seats would be both observed and effectively sequestered among their immediate companions, I proposed to watch as well as I could for movements and gatherings in the now presumably deserted regions of the house. Further, I must confess that I hoped for some glimpse of Excrucia. My fondest and most foolish wish was to snatch some moments of converse with her ere the ball began.
In these latter desires, I was frustrated. Indeed, I gained naught beyond an increase of both weariness and anxiety. In the first of my purposes, however, I found a measure of success. Treading narrow corridors which I had not previously explored, I encountered a series of chinks in the wall. They were widely spaced for some distance, and each provided a view into the common or sitting room of an apartment prepared for one of my Queen’s most honored guests, the five barons and their immediate families or companions.
For a moment, however, I did not enjoy my advantage. Slew was there ahead of me, and his presence checked me. I thought to withdraw at once, yet I was forestalled. Taking note of my arrival, he gestured a command to advance.
Thus condoned, I set my eye to the nearest spyhole, though Slew stood at the fourth.
Within I saw Baron Plinth seated rigid as my halberd in an armchair with his fists knotted on the rests. Beside him sat his wife, leaning close to him and whispering urgently. Indeed, she appeared to seek some private boon or course of action that he sternly denied. Unfortunately her words were inaudible to me.
In a cluster apart, the Baron’s five daughters chattered together, both flustered and eager, seeming younger than their years. Yet they were all attired as available women in search of husbands. Their gowns, though not elaborately expensive, displayed considerable attention to both provocation and modesty.
As I was unable to divine the subject of contention between the Baron and his lady, I moved on.
At the next chink, I did not linger. It granted me a glimpse of Baron Panderman and his companion as they waved flagons about, singing ribald songs with strenuous enthusiasm. In the interval since their arrival, they had amended their raiment but not their conduct, and one glimpse of them was more than I required.
At the third spyhole also, one glimpse sufficed for me. In the common room, I beheld Baron Venery and several of his women in various states of undress apparently seeking to exhaust themselves ere the more public festivities began. Grimacing to myself—perhaps because I had no acquaintance with such sport—I approached Slew.
I had learned to share my Queen’s beliefs. Indemnie’s prosperity was an edged blessing.
At Slew’s post, a single glance through the chink justified his attention. This sitting room had been provided for either Glare Estobate or Thrysus Indolent, though which I could not determine, for both were present. And they were alone. Every door to the apartment’s bedrooms was shut, as was that to the outer hallway.
That they were engaged in intense converse was plain. Unfortunately Baron Estobate stood with his fists on his hips and his back to the spyhole. Though his posture and manner suggested ferocity, his voice did not reach me.
However, Baron Indolent faced the wall behind which I regarded him. Though he endeavored to comport himself as a man poised for grim hazards, the eagerness in his gaze was as distinct as his words.
“And I repeat, my old friend,” insisted Thrysus Indolent, accompanying his speech with gestures of placation, “there is no cause to be precipitate. All is in readiness. Any premature act will harm our designs. You need only await the signal, and events will transpire as we have prepared them.”
Glare Estobate barked some demand, to which his companion replied with a shrug. “Who can say? We have readied ourselves for a variety of eventualities. Only the stars know which will first occur. That woman herself may provide an occasion, if our allies do not.”
With ill-concealed impatience, Baron Indolent continued, “Should some clearer sign fail us, however—” He raised his right arm before his companion. At his wrist, the ruffles of his shirt, pale burgundy in color, showed themselves beyond the deeper purple of his brocaded coat sleeve. There among them peeped a corner of purest white muslin. “I will contrive to drop my handkerchief where you cannot fail to see it. That will be our signal in the absence of a better one.”
Baron Estobate’s reply was guttural in the extreme, yet I heard—or perhaps only imagined—the word fireworks.
The smaller man flapped a dismissive hand. “My friend, you are too fretful. My men have already secreted themselves near the walls, or at high western windows. The blaze of their missiles cannot be doused by mere rain. Upon command, our summons will brighten even these louring heavens.”
At my side, Slew muttered some obscenity to which I gave no heed. The exchanges within the sitting room consumed me.
For some moments, Glare Estobate spoke in his harsh low growl. When he fell silent, Thrysus Indolent answered with an air of sadness, “On that point, I confess myself uncertain. Good Jakob Plinth is as predictable as sunset and moonrise. That woman, alas, is not. Her whims and gambols outstrip my foresight. They baffle the very stars. Should she proclaim or reveal nothing to sway Plinth’s rectitude, he will stand with us. His given word is his law. As you know, however, his word was not given without provisos. Beneath his ire lies a staunch desire to remain that woman’s subject. If she contrives to strike an appeasing note upon his honor, he may bend at last to his shrew-wife’s counsels—and bend at a moment untimely for our purposes.
“Nevertheless I am comforted by the knowledge that his forces await the same signal which commands your men.” There Baron Indolent grinned. “Even Jakob Plinth in a transport of rectitude cannot countermand our missiles if he does not live to do so.”
The sound of Baron Estobate’s gritted laughter chilled me. I had imagined a plethora of challenges from the barons, some honest, others feigned. Yet I had not conceived that a relish for plain murder might determine Indemnie’s fate.
However, Thrysus Indolent was not chilled. Briefly he and his comrade in treachery clasped each other’s arms. Then, grinning, the smaller man took his leave. Muttering darkly, Glare Estobate turned to one of the apartment’s bedrooms. Thus he passed from sight.
My knees wobbled as I withdrew from the spyhole. While I leaned my weakness on the opposite wall, small blots swam in my sight as though I had neglected breath. I had learned too much to master myself quickly. For that reason, a moment or three fled from me ere I recognized that Slew stood before me like a man poised for killing.
“Gather yourself, Hieronomer.” His low snarl was a slap. “We must act swiftly. Will you bear what we have heard to Her Majesty?”
Reeling inwardly, I stared up at him. “Without her summons? How?” I meant, How could I convey that my need to speak with her was urgent? With the feast close upon us, and no other man in martial livery present, she would be walled off with servants and guests, beyond my immediate reach. I would have to persuade one or several of her overworked attendants to deliver my message. “You have her ear. You must contrive to speak with her.”
Through his teeth, Slew swore at me. “I cannot. I have no time. I must find and end those men who hold Indolent’s signal missiles, and they will be well hidden.”
“No!” I blurted without pause for thought. “Do not!”
Upon the instant, Slew’s demeanor became as fatal as a dirk at my throat. “Not?” he demanded. “Do you also betray Her Majesty, Hieronomer?”
“No,” I insisted, panting. “No. Never. I serve her with my life. But you must think.” I struggled to do as I urged him. “There is much to consider. The failure of their signal will warn those barons that they are discovered. That in itself is of little concern. Yet Her Majesty, Slew—”
I beat upon my brow with my fists, striving to impose a measure of coherence on my thoughts. “She is aware of armies, Slew. She is aware of Indolent’s conniving with Estobate and Plinth. She has drawn the barons to her for some purpose that will serve Indemnie. And treason within the realm is not her sole consideration. She has cause to fear other foes, foes against which ready armies are her only defense. If those armies are not summoned—”
Slew cut me off. “What foes?”
I could have wept in frustration. “I know not. I cannot name them. I cannot account for them. Yet I have seen them. A darkness in the east seeks to enslave us. How, I know not. Why, I know not. Nonetheless I am certain of it. Two dooms await Indemnie, and treachery is not the greater. Even proud, clever, despicable Thrysus Indolent may set aside betrayal when he is threatened with slavery.”
In the gloom of the narrow passage, Slew was no more than a looming threat to my sight. With a twitch of his fingers, he might snap my neck. His instant dirk might open my throat ere I saw it move. Yet I held his bitter gaze without shrinking. The crisis of my service had begun, and of my Queen’s reign, and of Excrucia’s life. It could not be answered by cowardice.
The King's Justice Page 19
