The old woman, who I’d decided I greatly disliked, even if she wouldn’t have said any of this to my face, barked out a laugh, then wiped wine spittle from her chin. “Nooo, she ain’t! She’s no human woman. She’s half-animal, half-demon like her sister. No matter which kingdom wrestles the babe from her womb, the child will be no one’s heir. It’s an abomination against Glorianna and we’ll be lucky if it doesn’t pop out of her cursed cunt with horns and covered in fur!”
As happens in crowds, it seems, her vile words reached a peak right as the minstrel finished his tune and the background conversation lulled.
“Barbara!” one of her cronies hissed. “You mind your mouth. There are strangers among us and impressionable young ears. Perhaps you should take your apprentice away, midwife?”
“She’s heard worse,” Marin replied mildly, unconcerned as ever.
“Bah!” The garrulous woman poured more wine from the pitcher. “And if yon young missy is too missish”—and here she snorted wetly at her own joke—“to hear the truth, then she can retire to her lonely bed. What say you, missy? Are you a virgin yet, or have you enjoyed what a great, strong cock can do for you?”
My face heated and they all laughed, happy to have a diversion, and began teasing me about how long my young man could last and if my jaw grew sore or his did. I almost wished Marin would have taken the chance to spirit me out of there, but I also understood that this was one of her ongoing lessons—mixed, perhaps, with a bit of payback for what I’d put her through with Kir. I let my blushes speak for me and kept the lid on my box of memories tightly closed.
They were for me, and me alone. At least I understood the jokes now.
“You ladies seem to be having a fine evening,” a lovely tenor voice flowed over us. The minstrel stood there with his lap harp, smiling in a charming way. “Can I add to your frivolity with a bit of song?”
His gaze passed over us, then returned to me, lingering. Hastily I frowned at my knitting, resisting the urge to press the furrows away. Marin had pointed out that I looked less like the paintings of me when I scowled, so I tried to do that if anyone gazed too long. And fervently hoped the lines wouldn’t truly linger as my nurse had so often warned.
“Yes, boy.” The old woman’s eyes seemed glued to his trousers. “Sing to us of the Great War. ‘The Wolf Song.’ ”
He grinned easily. “And lose my head to the High King’s executioner? You’d have to tip me well indeed, my lady.”
She hmphed in irritation. “I know well the innkeeper is paying your wage. I have no intention of lining your greedy pockets, too.”
“Forgive my lack of enthusiasm, then,” he returned with such smooth courtesy that she only grunted.
“I’ll have a tune.” Marin rummaged in her pocket for a coin. “Sing us one about the Princess, our future queen.”
Several others, including the pregnant one, agreed with enthusiasm. As if they thought to make up for their uncharitable conversation with renewed patriotism.
“That I can do,” he agreed. “The High King famously dotes upon his youngest, you know.” He sat, straddling a stool, and set the keys on his harp. “I saw her once, on a visit to the court at Ordnung.”
Glorianna save me. Why in the Twelve Kingdoms had Marin encouraged him to stay? Surely he’d recognize me.
“Did you?” One lady who’d been quiet so far perked up. “Surely the tales exaggerate—she can’t be as lovely as they claim. All that nonsense about sunrises and birdsong.”
“Oh, but she is.” He grinned and winked at her. The man seemed to have his smile honed into a fine art—or a deadly weapon—he wielded it with such skill. “Of course, she doesn’t look like light or sound like a bird, but there’s something about her that makes one think of those things. Something ethereal . . . and unmistakable.”
I felt his gaze on me again and wished I’d been able to knit something larger than a hankie to hide behind. A kind of crooked one at that. It was supposed to become a baby blanket, so Marin assured me was possible, but I imagined he’d be on the High King’s throne before I managed to put that many rows together.
“More”—he plucked a few chords—“she has a loving heart. It shows in her words and deeds. Always a smile for those who serve her and a kind word for the least around her.”
Marin snorted and rubbed her nose. I wanted to kick her. It was her fault we were subjected to this.
“It seemed every man—and more than a few women—fell a little bit in love with her. Not only for the alabaster curve of her cheek, or the violet glory of her eyes, but for the way she embodies love. As with Glorianna herself.”
“No one has violet eyes,” one woman protested. “They’re just blue.”
“Not so, my fine lady”—he played softly, a harmony I didn’t recognize—“they’re true violet, like a pansy. I’d know them anywhere.
I kept my violet eyes locked on my knitting. Impossible that he could see the color in the dim tavern. No one had commented on them in ages.
Fortunately, he launched into the song.
Look not for the maid of roses,
She of the violet and cream.
Dusted away are her sunrises,
Gold burned into gleam.
Turn around and see.
Turn around and look for yourself.
Gone is the girl of your youth.
Gone away into the sea.
Where have you gone, my lovely one?
What made you leave us behind? Sunrises fall into sunsets
True love is buried in snow.
Turn around and see.
Turn around and look for yourself.
Gone is the maiden of roses.
Swallowed up into the sea.
The final haunting notes faded away and I became aware that I’d stopped knitting and the point of one needle pressed painfully into my palm. My ears rang with a sense of foreboding, a wordless warning.
“I’ve never heard that song before,” the old lady grumped.
“It’s new,” he answered easily.
“What does that mean, that she’s gone?” The pregnant lady sounded unhappy. “Are you saying she’s dead? Drowned? Surely we would have heard.”
“It’s a metaphor, Suze,” another answered. “It means she’s no longer a maid because she’s becoming a mother. Maiden, mother, crone. That’s the succession of a woman’s life.”
The older woman had fallen into a drunken sleep, chin propped on her ample bosom and knitting forgotten in her lap. They all looked at her and away again.
“Who wants to become the crone?” one whispered, and they all fell into a fit of giggles.
“The crone is also the wise woman,” Marin asserted. “She who’s gained the knowledge of experience and has honed her skills in the world.”
“Certainly a finer way to look at it,” the minstrel agreed, standing. “I shall bid you ladies good evening.”
24
In the morning, as we saddled up, the minstrel appeared again, leading his horse and giving me a saucy wink I caught even with my eyes averted. His dark hair shone with red glints in the sun and his eyes seemed to be an unusually sharp silvery blue.
“What is he doing here?” I hissed under my breath at Marin. She managed to shrug while looking as if she only struggled to stuff something into her saddlebag. Graves hailed the minstrel, clapping his shoulder.
“This is Wyle. Likely you all heard him in the tavern last night. He’s offered to entertain us on the way to Castle Avonlidgh in exchange for protection from the various wild animals along the way,” Graves announced. He made a wry face, making it clear that they, too, had heard the tales of the Mohrayan press-gangs.
I gritted my teeth against the urge to protest. And to question our direction. We were meant to be bound for Windroven. As we traveled, I fretted over it. The gossip had been only that—idle talk and tale spinning. But I had been alone in that carriage with Erich, felt his lecherous grip on my thigh, and knew quite well what went on in t
he unclean crevices of his mind. I hadn’t been practiced enough then to interpret what I sensed, but now I knew how to label that scent.
The ladies knew how these things went. To control the babe, Erich needed to control me. I would never make it to Windroven. It occurred to me, as I retraced the conversations in my mind, that he’d always said I’d return to Avonlidgh. I had assumed Windroven, not Castle Avonlidgh, his seat.
A very foolish assumption.
At first opportunity, I rode up next to Skunk. Wyle and Graves seemed to be great buddies already, laughing and joking with each other. Graves didn’t much care to talk with me, and besides, a girl of my apparent station wouldn’t approach him anyway. In this kind of circumstance, my disguise grated on me and provided no succor or amusement. What I wanted most was to command that we go straight to Windroven.
And for Graves to knock that nosy minstrel over the head and leave him in the borrow ditch.
“Why did Graves say we’re bound for Castle Avonlidgh?” I asked Skunk casually, so anyone eavesdropping would think we discussed the weather.
Skunk’s shoulders slumped a little. “Commander said you wouldn’t be happy. King’s orders. We’re to report in.”
“Castle Avonlidgh is nearly on the Duranor border.” I said it mainly so they’d understand I wasn’t completely ignorant. “It’s not exactly on the way. And with everything going on . . .”
“I know.” Skunk dropped his voice. “But I have no more power than you do. Graves is fixed on this.”
His words hit home with a prickle up my spine. I’d become so accustomed to my new persona that I’d nearly forgotten that they all served me. Not the reverse. It was one thing to learn humility—and I had—it was entirely another to give up my power. My power and might, that came from me.
That came from people knowing who I was.
Accident of birth or not, that was mine. Another weapon I needed to learn to wield.
I laid the seeds at lunchtime, pretending that I wasn’t hungry and pleading fatigue. When we resumed riding in the midafternoon, I watched the signs for a good-sized town, preferably one I recognized. Graves preferred to stop at the roadside inns, where we’d blend with other travelers more easily. As if in answer to a prayer, the sign, when I spotted it, was perfect.
When we were barely short of Lianore, serendipitously the home of one of my ladies, Giseleigh, and thus the seat of one of Avonlidgh’s nobles, I began clutching my stomach and groaning.
Graves called a halt and Marin tended to me with several teas, eyes narrowed. The men, naturally, gave us plenty of room, so when she asked me what game I was up to—good thing I didn’t have to fool her—no one overheard us.
“Do we have much coin?” I asked her.
“We meaning, do I?” she returned archly. “For, to be sure, Graves was entrusted with the funds to convey you safely about.”
Daughter of the High King, Princess of the Realm, future Queen of Avonlidgh, and not a penny in my pocket. Richly ironic. And ridiculously careless of me. Holding my belly and whispering prayers of protection to Glorianna for the babe, lest she take me seriously and truly put the child in danger, I told Marin my plan.
“I’ll help you, Princess.” She pretended to feel my forehead. “To be sure and it will be good to have you in your rightful place. You have rank and duty to uphold, and your people deserve to see you for yourself as you pass among them.”
“I understand that’s what you wanted me to see, but . . . Marin, they hate me.” I felt a little broken and pitiful about that. All this time I’d thought I was so loved and really no one cared for me. Except in unexpected places.
“They don’t know you,” Marin returned. “And you’re going to fix that.”
She rose and went to Graves, gesturing to me. He frowned, shaking his head as he had at the pass. Stubborn man. I groaned and drew up my knees, trying to look pale and miserable. Finally he came over and knelt beside me.
“The midwife wants to take you to the Lianore manse,” he said, “but I feel this is unwise. Can you make it to the inn?”
“Maybe.” I tried to look brave. “Hopefully I won’t lose the babe if I try.”
He looked as stricken as I’d hoped. “What of the minstrel? He’d never believe we’d deviate for a lowly maid.”
I nearly broke character, wanting to smack him for his blindness. For a smart and stalwart soldier, he had some remarkably narrow views. “He knows perfectly well who I am. He recognized me at the inn last night, which is, no doubt, why he weaseled his way into your company. Take me to Lianore manse so Marin can get the supplies she needs to ensure my health and that of your next king.”
I thought I’d maybe laid it on a little thick, but Graves, if nothing else, was a trained soldier, and he responded viscerally to the sting of command in my voice. In fact, he nearly saluted me, barely stopping himself.
In no time, Skunk had been sent to the manse, returning with a carriage for Marin and her “sick apprentice.” Lady Giseleigh, Gilly to her friends, had often spoken of her mother Lady Lianore’s soft heart. Glorianna surely smiled on my plan, opening a rose-petal-strewn path to this opportunity.
Though they took me to the servants’ quarters when we arrived, I was given a private room, which was exceptionally large and well furnished. I made a mental note to review Windroven’s facilities. I should do no less for my people than Lady Lianore did.
As I’d hoped, the lady herself paid me a visit. And, though I wouldn’t have been able to pick her out of a crowd, she drew up short the moment she entered the room, gaping at me.
“Good Glorianna,” she breathed. “You’re not . . .”
Pulling off the kerchief, I gave up the appearance of illness and stood, taking Lady Lianore’s hands. “Your reputation for giving succor to the least of Glorianna’s daughters precedes you, Duchess Lianore. I depended upon it, as I’ve been traveling incognito.”
She clutched my hands, her skin cool with shock. “Princess! I mean, Your Highness, I—” Abruptly she tried to kneel, but I stopped her.
“I think we’re past the formalities, Lady Lianore. Gilly has been a great friend to me and I fear I must ask you to be, also. Will you help me?”
“Anything!” she gasped. “Lianore is so honored by your presence. We are so small and out of the way, that—oh, the people would so love to have met you. I hate that we haven’t properly received you.”
“I have been on a long, strange journey, seeking to preserve the future of Avonlidgh and the rights of Hugh’s child.”
“Then it’s true.” She squeezed my hands. “I told everyone you would be loyal to Avonlidgh. Do you travel to Windroven, to have the babe there, as is the tradition?”
“I do. I vow to have Hugh’s heir at Windroven.” I decided to take the risk. “But some, among them soldiers in my retinue, seek to stop me. They intend for me to go to Castle Avonlidgh instead.”
Her snapping brown eyes took on sharp indignation at that. “Canny Old Erich. I should not be surprised.”
“I believe that the people of Avonlidgh will support me in my quest to go to Windroven—and stay there.”
“Yes, they will.” She drew herself up with pride. “I speak for Lianore and we support you. What can we do?”
Ursula would likely have laughed at me, but sometimes a pretty new gown and a ball are the solution.
Lady Lianore—Veronica, she asked me to call her, though she refused to call me by my name—arranged for a bath, cosmetics, and her seamstress to alter a dress intended for Gilly. She even loaned me her own jewels, proclaiming that the people would expect no less.
Though we’d arrived in late afternoon, by the supper hour not only had Veronica dispatched a messenger to Castle Avonlidgh, where it turned out my entire retinue had been diverted, but she’d also arranged a grand feast and invited the pillars of the local community to attend.
Marin reported that Graves didn’t like it but had been mollified by assurances that I enjoyed a deep and drugged
sleep and that Lady Lianore had planned this entertainment for ages. Her valiantly loyal staff backed her tale seamlessly, and none had an inkling of the courier sent to Castle Avonlidgh.
So far as Erich would believe, I’d thrown a very typical tantrum and insisted on having all of my ladies about me for the journey to his side. By the time he knew different, I planned to be safely inside the walls of Windroven, which even Rayfe and all the might of the Tala had been unable to breach.
Hopefully Erich would recognize that and not put me and the strength of Windroven to the test. But if he did, I fully intended to lock him out until the babe was born. After that . . . well, I had months to come up with a plan.
First steps first.
My grand entrance went perfectly. After all the guests were seated, rumors buzzing about a delightful mystery guest, I stepped into the room, pausing in the scrolled doorway, flanked by flaming sconces.
I’d left my hair down. Newly clean and shining, it spilled in brilliant contrast to the pearly white gown. Diamonds sparkled at my ears, throat, and wrists. The cosmetics applied by Veronica’s lady emphasized the violet in my eyes—I intended to layer on proof of who I was—and the court minstrels played one of the most famous of “my” songs.
Gratifyingly, the assembly gasped, their admiration and wonder flowing over me like the scent of jasmine on a summer night. Seated with the Lianore minstrels, Wyle tipped a wry salute at me, and Graves, face as red as an overheated teakettle, glowered at me from the soldiers’ tables.
He and I would speak later, and he—and all his men—could make their choices then.
Lady Lianore introduced me, as if it were necessary, and the meal was delayed as each guest insisted on paying fealty, creating a line that lasted quite some time. Even Graves came up with Lianore’s officers, his ire banked with ruthless discipline, as he bowed over my hand.
“You appear to be feeling much better, Your Highness,” he said, with pointed courtesy.
The Tears of the Rose Page 24
