Emberverse 08: The Tears of the Sun

by S. M. Stirling

  Yseult felt her lip pout out and sucked it back in. Lady Mary had a habit of pinching it if she pouted in front of her. The housekeeper shook her head and hesitated, before opening the door to the large bright room that was the servants’ sewing room. Five peasant girls were sitting by the north-facing windows. They looked up and smiled before continuing their work. Romarec spread the altar cloth with its white on white counted cross-stitch over a table in the back. She lowered her voice.

  “It’s not something I should talk to you about; it’s not safe. The Lady Regent was so furious your mother nearly lost her head. Those assassins were sent by a kingdom to the east; Cutters they call them. Your mother and your Uncle Guelf snuck them in, hid them, and gave them money and information. Your mother’s goal, as she told me, was the death of the Mackenzie tanist. Rudi Mackenzie, their Chief’s son. But it all went wrong, and the Princess Mathilda and Lord Odard were put in mortal peril as well.”

  Yseult froze, the room going dark around her. Sparks of light starred the blackness and she swayed, clumsily thrusting a hand out for balance. Romarec’s scolding sounded distant through the sea-surf roaring in her ears. Something hit the back of her legs and she sat abruptly on a hard chair. A glass was thrust in her hands and that distant voice ordered her: “Sip!”

  Yseult felt her teeth begin to chatter and clenched her jaw. I won’t be weak! She sipped, nearly coughed at the fiery-sweet taste of the herbed apricot brandy in the flask and looked up, her sight clearing. Romarec’s concerned eyes met hers. She nodded and sipped again.

  “My mother endangered the Princess?” she whispered, incredulous. “That would be treason, and not petty treason either! Why are any of us still alive?” Her mind made a leap. “Odard! Odard fought for her. She must have begged his life of the Lady Regent.”

  Then she waved her hand as Romarec glanced to either side again. “No! No, you are right. Not now. Some other day. Now, I should do what Mama says.”

  A frisson of fear ran down her back, a physical sensation like the edge of nausea, and she shuddered. Her appalled understanding of her mother’s idiocy made her stomach twist as if she’d eaten green apples, a knowledge as much of the gut as the brain. Fear for herself warred with fear for the whole family; high treason could see them all executed and the lands attainted. And treason was tried before the Court of Star-Chamber, not a jury of your peers. The Lady Regent was not known for being forgiving about anything, much less the life of her only child and heir. Having that child and heir run off—the rumors were plain it had been without permission, and there had been a rare public loss of temper by the Lady Regent—wouldn’t have made her any sweeter about it.

  Goodwife Romarec nodded and straightened up, speaking in a normal voice: “Well, my little Mistress, seeing that you have been assigned to sew with me, I’ll tell you that I can really use the help. These are five new maids, each as clumsy as a cow with her needle and each one worse than the last, but they’re all I have, now the maids-in-waiting are gone, to sew all the clothes that we must provide for the castle. We need to make sure the Christmas distribution is done, and we only have a few months to get through the tasks.”

  Yseult smiled. She wished she could hug so lowly a person as the housekeeper. But Lady Mary frowned on what she called Yseult’s familiarity with the lower classes. That was old-fashioned thinking, of course. Nowadays nobles knew who they were. Instead she nodded.

  “Yes, Romarec, I think that will help me become more disciplined. What times do you think I should work for you?”

  “I . . .” Romarec studied the altar cloth, running it through her hands. “What are these symbols?” she asked.

  Yseult shook her head. “Mama tells me what to embroider, by the count. She’ll give me a starting point, but she won’t explain. She told me that it would make me concentrate more, that I was getting distracted and letting the colors and shapes guide my hands and not the pattern, itself.”

  Romarec shook her head. The last foot of cloth she frowned at. “This? She thinks this must be taken out? Child, your mother never could decide from which side of her mouth she should blow! I can see the difference, with my eyes six inches from the cloth, but on an altar at five yards, white on white, it’s not going to show at all. Howsoever, your Lady Mother is sure to ask and inspect. So, come meet my new girls, pick this out and I will expect you here from nine in the morning every day. You will have elevenses with us and eat dinner with the castle staff and work until three in the afternoon.”

  “And then?”

  “Thusly, Master Johannsen will still see you at four for your riding lesson, and we will inform Mistress Virgilia that your tutoring will be in the evening.”

  Yseult nodded, relieved to be free of the hot, boring solar and out of her mother’s sole company.

  How awful! I never felt like this about Mama, before. But there were always maids with us!

  She picked out the slightly sloppy stitches, wondering why Guelf was in Gervais and what the war news from Pendleton was.

  Maybe Guelf brought a letter from Huon? Or one from Odard! Dispatches? Or mischief? Mischief! What a word for high treason. What will happen to us?

  She tried to settle the gnawing worm of anxiety in her stomach by ignoring it, forcing her hands not to twitch. She wasn’t very successful. Some time later as she carefully taught Martha how to do a stretch stitch so the cuffs would stand up to rough handling she suddenly wondered:

  Jesus’ wounds! Should I tell the Regent my uncle is here? What if he ran away? No, he’ d never run from a fight . . . But, what is he doing here? What should I do? Odard! Huon! Where are you? I need your help!

  At three, her dilemma still unresolved, she raced up the stairs and back corridors to her own apartment, two rooms in the west tower’s third story; the light was always a little dim here, because this low the windows were all narrow slits, but space was always at a premium in a castle. The passageways seemed very empty and bare without the men who’d marched east with the host to Pendleton; it made you realize how the vassals and their menies doing garrison duty made up so much of its usual population. With only the families of the permanent staff and the remnant of older men and boys too young to take the field she felt like one of a handful of dried peas dropped into a drum.

  Her maidservant helped her out of the soft violet cote-hardie and rose linen chemise, then hesitated.

  “Is there news from the war, my lady?”

  Yseult blinked, and then remembered that the girl had a sweetheart who was a spearman; her previous maid had been her first, and had just left to marry a blacksmith in town.

  “No, Hathvisa, there isn’t. I’ll tell you if I hear anything, though.”

  “Thank you, my lady. The riding habit?”

  “Yes, please.”

  She pulled on a riding tunic, then the heavy brown pleated wool split skirt, and shrugged into the short tight jacket. She rejoiced in the relative freedom of movement the riding habit gave her as she stamped into her boots and snatched up the hard leather riding hat. Racing down the stairs she was tempted to stop at the little prie-dieu just inside the door of the castle chapel her mother had set up to the Immaculate Conception and St. Bernadette.

  Later, when I get back! That’s what I’ll do! I’ll ask my saint and see if she can help me figure out what to do!

  Master Johannsen was waiting for her in the courtyard, holding the reins of her spirited little bay palfrey, Iomedea. Yseult shook her head at his offer of a leg up, swung into the saddle and then followed him out into the pasture north of the town that the castle also used as a training and tilting ground. That was empty too, none of the tall coursers or destriers whose hoofprints still marked the green turf, the stands that were put up for a tourney gone except for the anchor-points.

  The lesson concentrated on defensive and aggressive moves that an unarmed woman, mounted, could use when under attack. With her new understanding of her danger from her mother’s actions, Yseult wondered at the content of her lesson
since January. They finished with his usual command.

  “Ride now, for an hour, practicing your canter and trot.”

  Another hour of freedom from the solar was precious to her.

  I might not be horse-mad like some girls, she thought. But I’ll take a horse over alone with Mama right now, any day! And I don’t even have to take an escort, with men so short.

  She finished off her workout by taking the bridle path northeast along 99E, up to the tangle of vines and quick growing sumac, poplar and hemlock and sapling oak that was rapidly obliterating the burned-out site of old Woodburn. Her father and later her mother had supervised the stripping and destruction of the deserted town. She could just remember watching the foresters fire the controlled burn when she was five, and the quickgrowing trees planted for fuel and coppice were already fifteen or twenty feet tall in this moist mild climate.

  She circled north on the edge of the raw young forest. Only the castle folk used South Boones Ferry Road, so she shook the reins and galloped over the familiar winding path, spurring Iomedea around the bend into Parr. A man stepped into the path and snatched at the bay’s bridle. Yseult gasped but there was no time to be afraid, or to think. Horsemaster Johannsen’s voice rang in her head.

  “Wait for it, wait . . . four, three, two . . .”

  Iomedea reared and crow-hopped, obedient to the signals she sent. She raised her quirt . . .

  Thee may not need it, little Mistress, she heard Johannsen say in her mind, But nonetheless, I’ll be teaching thee a few maneuvers. The mare’s a nice girl and will learn well, and it never hurts to know.

  Even as she brought the quirt down, cutting at the ragged man, her eyes met his. He started, dodged the whip and jumped back into the trees. Yseult gasped and set Iomedea forward at a hard gallop, her heart pounding.

  I didn’t think I would need a groom here! On my own land! Who was that? she wondered. I thought I knew him, just for an instant . . . I’d better tell the guard captain right away.

  Anxiety and fear rode with her as she hurried back to town at a trot. She pulled up at the edge of the built-up area; Gervais wasn’t big enough to rate a city wall. A Tinerant caravan was setting up as she did, their barrel-shaped house-wagons grouped in a square and a wild music of violins and guitars sounding; the ragged, gaudy figures made extravagant bows . . . one of them still juggling cups and daggers and apples while he did. A storyteller was declaiming to an audience of village youngsters and youths: “Know, O Prince, that between the years when the oceans drank Atlantis and the gleaming cities, and the rise of the Sons of Aryas, there was an Age undreamed of, when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars . . .”

  She threaded her way through the crowds, not presuming too much on deference; she was a lady, but a very young one. Early evening, just as the sun set, was her favorite time in Gervais; everybody was in a good mood and thronging the streets between the shingled brick and half-timber houses and workshops, calling greetings and laughing. Hooves clattered on brick or asphalt paving.

  Then a chill. A detachment of men-at-arms in the black armor of the Protector’s Guard lounged in front of the Chinese Hand Inn, drinking beer and munching on bread and bowls of sweet-and-sour chicken. They whistled and wolf-called as she rode by, laughing at her glare and elevated nose. An under-officer came out of the inn with a wineglass in one hand and a chicken leg in the other to snarl at them: “Show some manners there, you dogs! Can’t you see that’s a lady?”

  Doubtless they were the escort for some courier. Yseult arrived back at the castle with her cheeks flushed by more than good exercise.

  As she dismounted in the stables, her uncle Guelf Mortimer strode in, calling for his groom. He saw her.

  “Where’ve you been, brat? Your mother’s that worried about you! Go to her right now!”

  Yseult ducked around him and ran. Guelf was rough spoken and known to slap people who displeased him. Her other uncle, Jason, many years dead, had been rough mannered, too. Yseult rushed into the castle.

  Why’s he so mean? I might as well stay downstairs with the cow-handed sewing maids, she thought resentfully. At least they are polite to me! Of course, they have to be.

  In the great hall she hesitated, torn between conflicting desires. The chapel and prayer called; Guelf had ordered her to go to Mary, and she really needed to change.

  Chapel can wait until after dinner, she decided. I’ll be calmer then and won’t hurry things. I must listen for the voice of the saint or the Immaculata with calm or I won’t hear it. So, what to do now? It’s a toss-up. Will Mama be angrier with me for coming to see her in all my dirt or if I come in later and make her wait? I’d better go see her first.

  She scratched at the door and slipped in when her mother called.

  “Back?” asked Mary.

  Yseult eyed her warily. She stood by the fireplace stirring the coals with an iron poker. There was a sheet of paper in her hand and the grate was adrift in ashes. Ashes sullied the expensive rug from Oregon City that Mary stood on. More papers littered the large worktable by the southern windows.

  “Yes, Mama.”

  “Well, how do you like spending the day with the sewing maids?”

  There was small sneer in Mary’s voice. What is she sneering about? Me liking the maids? Or did Uncle Guelf upset her? He’s always telling her what to do and it makes her mad.

  She answered the question with a question. Father Haggerty got annoyed when she lied to her mother. “Working with five cow-handed seamstress apprentices? How do you think I like it?”

  Ooops, that sounded really impertinent, and my voice sneered too.

  Mary giggled, a sound Yseult had never heard her make before and tossed the paper into the fire. “Well, indulge your taste for the lower orders. I think . . . it’s September . . . October, November, December, January, February, March . . . Yes, my fool of a daughter can leave the company of hicks and fools on April Fool’s Day. That works out nicely. You may have your supper and lessons with Virgilia in the evening and break your fast with me in the morning, here in the solar.”

  Yseult gaped and then snapped her mouth shut. What will happen on April Fool’s Day? she wondered. And why is she giggling? Usually she’s mad after Uncle is here!

  She watched Mary pick up another piece of paper and suddenly wondered. Where is her rosary? I haven’t seen it dangling from her belt in months. She used to make such a point about it, about being Catholic originally not a change-Christian . . . but I haven’t seen it . . . in forever.

  Mary turned towards her, raising the very fine, fair, plucked brows. “Did you need anything before you sit down to lessons?” she asked.

  “No, Mama.”

  Yseult swallowed and shook her head. She edged her way to the servants’ door in the west wall, intent on getting out of her mother’s presence.

  I have to think! Why am I just noticing things now? What do they mean?

  The rosary was gone from her mother’s belt and so was the lovely enameled locket of the Annunciation she had always worn; a gift from her father. Mary giggled again and turned back to the fire.

  The main door to the room crashed open. “I arrest you, Mary Liu, Dowager Baroness of Barony Gervais on the charge of High Treason. Do not resist your arrest or you may be put to the Question, or executed out of hand!”

  Yseult froze, breathless. Her mind went blank as the Lady Regent’s men tramped into the room in full armor, swords drawn. It was as if her mind was an eye, and it had looked into the sun.

  Mary reacted instantly. She whirled from the fire, her green silk cote-hardie swirling and flaring into the hot coals as she grabbed the poker like a club and ran. She managed to get two steps from the fireplace, running towards the paper-loaded table, her burning train scattering glowing embers across the carpet. The sergeant behind the captain was faster; two strides brought him within reach of Mary and he swung an armored fist to her stomach with a dull thud.

  Mary’s sm
all body rose until the tips of her satin slippers left the rug, then folded around the point of impact as if bending in. The poker fell with a muffled thud. The servants’ door slammed open into Yseult’s back, throwing her face down, left cheek skinning across the precious rug and grinding into the hot embers.

  “We’ve got possession of the Castle, Sir Garrick,” said the man at arms standing by her head.

  Yseult gasped and choked and sneezed on the fine paper ashes. She lay dazed, unable to move; to understand what was happening; to see anything but the man’s steel sabatons and the point of the long sword in his hand; to hear anything but the harsh voices and the creak and clatter of armor as they moved around the infinitely familiar room now made strange. She could see her mother’s small body heaving.

  The sergeant beat out the flames in Mary’s silk skirts with his gauntleted hands. She fought madly as soon as she managed to whoop in a breath; struggling and screeching, clawing at the armored man as though her soft nails could rake through an Associate’s panoply. Two more men at arms, men Yseult recognized as part of the group who’d teased her earlier, trotted in with a bundle of white cloth.

  Mary was yanked upright, her arms forced into sleeves much too long for her, the tunic buckled in back and then the arms crossed over, wrapped around and the sleeves brought forward to buckle in front. Yseult shuddered, gasping, almost glad she was lying on the ground in case she fainted.

  Mama’s eyes! she thought. They’re black. No, they can’t be. The pupils must have gotten so big I can’t see the color . . . I think I’m going to be sick.

  A second cloth was wrapped and strapped around her waist and legs. Mary’s headdress fell off, her graying blond braid flopping free, coming loose in wild tangles, her body still heaving and twisting in the soldiers’ hands. Yseult propped herself up with her right hand, her left cheek throbbing, her left arm a mass of throbbing pain from shoulder to wrist. Three clerks were helping the man called Captain Garrick sort through the papers on the table; he was a tallish brown-haired man with a neat pointed chin-beard and mustache, in full armor except for the gauntlets and helm. Two more were smothering the fire and carefully pulling out the charred scraps.