by Tanya Huff
She took a cautious sip and her entire face puckered. “It’s a little sour.”
Leonas snorted. “So’s the sister.” Then, without prodding, he launched into a long, complicated story of how the berries were being tried out by some of the sea-traders—”… cheaper than relying only on them imported limes …”—and looked as though they might become an important cash crop for the area.
Annice ate while he talked, eyes locked on his face.
At last he paused, head cocked toward the door. “Someone coming,” he said shortly, piled empty dishes back on their tray, and turned to go.
“Leonas.” She searched for the right words and finally found, “Thank you.”
He snorted again. “You’re welcome, Princess.”
Annice squelched the urge to follow him out into the hall and instead waited by the fire, shifting her weight from foot to foot. She didn’t know why she was so nervous, she and Stasya had been walking in and out of each other’s lives since they first met as fledglings. All right, so the circumstances are a little different. I’m playing a duet and she just spent two and a half months helping to bring my baby’s father to his execution. That shouldn’t affect us.
When the door finally opened, she found it didn’t.
“Center it, Stas, you look like shit.”
Stasya sagged against the door frame, one corner of her mouth twisting up in the ghost of a smile. Although she’d managed to find time to wash the dirt from her face and hands, her clothing still bore evidence of the road, bits of dried mud flaking off the cloth with every movement. Her short dark hair lay plastered lifelessly against her head, the shade very nearly matched by the circles under her eyes. “Thanks.” She sighed deeply. “I missed you, too.”
* * * *
“So you’re still Singing fire?”
“As long as it’s already contained.” Annice opened the tap from the boiler, tested the temperature of the water, and closed it again. The four notes she Sang to the kigh dancing in the steel pan of charcoal provoked a burst of activity. Satisfied, she used the rim of the tub to pull herself erect, then turned and sat on the broad edge. “I don’t think I’d dare Sing fire outside where anything in the Circle might ignite.” Reaching under her clothing, she scratched at the stretched curve of skin. “The water’ll be hot by the time you get undressed.”
She watched for a moment as the other woman fumbled with ties and buttons and finally went over to help. “Are you sure this is a good idea?” she asked. “Maybe you should just have a quick wash in the basin and go to bed. I don’t want you to drown.”
Stasya emerged from the folds of her shirt emphatically shaking her head. “I have been dreaming about this tub for the last three nights … ever since we left Vidor. Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve had a nice long soak?”
“Don’t tell me.” Annice wrinkled her nose and stuffed the soiled clothing down the laundry chute, trying not to touch the filthy fabric any more than she had to. “I don’t think I can stand knowing.” Breathing shallowly through her mouth, she checked the water temperature again and this time let it continue to run. “Was it really bad?”
“Tub first, talk later.” Stasya repeated the phrase that had brought them down to the bathing room. Her hand on Annice’s shoulder, she stepped over the high side of the tub and, sighing deeply, lowered herself into the rapidly rising water. “I’ll tell you one thing, though, I don’t care what oaths I took or how much my country needs me, I’m never getting on a horse again.”
“You’ve lost weight.”
“Weight, teeth, and my sunny disposition.”
Annice stopped scooping soft soap onto a huge sponge and whirled around so fast she nearly fell over. “Teeth?”
“Well, not really.” Stasya sank lower in the water, rubbing without enthusiasm at the gray of old dirt ground into her skin. “But I’m sure that one of the top ones, on the right, at the back, is loose.”
“Stas, you always worry about your teeth.” She Sang the kigh a gratitude as the boiler drained and the charcoal went from white hot to barely warm. “And your teeth are always fine. Sit up a bit so I can wash your hair, I’m not as flexible as I used to be.”
“How are you?”
“I drop nearly everything I pick up, my ankles are two sizes bigger in the evening than they are in the morning, I have to pee all the time, I can’t bend, and I’m sick of talking about it. Rinse.” When Stasya reemerged and had knuckled her eyes dry, she added, “Elica says I’m healthy, the baby’s healthy, and everything’s happening right on schedule. Nothing’s changed since Tadeus left and we lost touch.”
They killed another few minutes discussing Tadeus, and the few after that covering the list of “reminders” Jazep had left when he’d headed out into the country the morning after First Quarter Festival. “I’m telling you, Stas, he’s worse than Elica and Leonas combined.” Washing Stasya’s back, Annice told stories about Singing in the city and silently urged her to bring up the one thing they had to discuss. Finally, she could stand it no longer. “Stas …”
“I know.” She pulled herself up, reaching for a towel. “I guess I’m ready to go through it again.”
* * * *
“What are you crying about?”
Annice shrugged and swiped at her nose. “I don’t know.”
“Look, Nees, he’s guilty.” Stasya drained a mug of water, her voice rough from the recall. “Right out of his own mouth. If he’d just accepted that his stupid plan had failed and resigned himself to fate, none of the rest would have happened.” She hated the very concept of defending Troop Captain Otik but found herself doing it anyway. “There was no more force used than was necessary to get him back to Elbasan and he created the need for every last bit of it himself.”
“I’m not saying that he isn’t guilty, Stas; I mean, no one can lie under Command. I just can’t believe I was so wrong about him. I just didn’t think Pjerin was the kind of man who’d break a sworn oath.”
Stasya’s memory ran through a kaleidoscopic review of Pjerin a’Stasiek, Duc of Ohrid, from the moment she’d first seen him scowling down at Captain Otik, through the countless attempts to escape on the trip to the capital, to the final image of him struggling to rise after being cut free of the horse by the palace stables and dumped like so much garbage to the ground. While he managed to remain both arrogant and abrasive even during the increasingly rough handling he’d received, she would’ve sworn that his pride came from a strong sense of self-worth based solidly in the real world and that he fought for more than just a chance to avoid death.
She looked up and met Annice’s gaze. “If I didn’t know better,” she said heavily, “I wouldn’t believe it of him myself.”
* * * *
“Your Grace?”
Pjerin shifted on the bench, enough so he could bring the doorway into the field of his good eye.
“My name is Damek i’Kamila.” The middle-aged man stepped into the room and the heavy, reinforced door slammed shut behind him. “I’m a healer.”
“You’ll forgive me if I don’t rise.”
“Actually, I’m here to do something about that.” He set the small leather bag he carried on the floor and frowned up at the gray light spilling through the one tiny window. “Well, it’s not much, but as they wouldn’t allow me to bring in a lantern it will have to do. I don’t suppose you can slide down to the other end of the bench?”
In answer, Pjerin reached down beside him with his right hand and lifted his left onto his lap. Around the left wrist, he wore an iron manacle, attached by a short length of chain to an iron ring set into the stone wall.
Damek shook his head disapprovingly. “Yes, I see. Then I suppose this will suffice. Can you not move that arm on its own?”
“I can. But I’d rather not.”
“Ribs broken?”
“You’re the healer,” Pjerin grunted, closing his eye. “You tell me.”
“Yes. All right, then. Just give me a moment
Pjerin listened to the other man’s breathing fall into a slow, steady rhythm, each lungful very purposefully drawn in, each lungful very purposefully expelled and in spite of himself he began to relax. Although he flinched at the initial touch, he welcomed the warmth spreading out from under gentle fingers and, because he knew it was coming, he managed to bite down on the scream when a sudden burst of heat seared his side. It lasted only an instant and when it faded, most of the pain faded with it.
“Still broken,” the healer told him as he opened his eye. “But all the pieces are aligned again and held and it should heal leaving no lasting disability. You know …” Squatting, Damek opened his case and pulled out a small vial. “… there are those who believe that there’s a type of kigh within the body and healers manipulate it much as bards manipulate the kigh of the elements. Let me tell you, young man, if that’s true, you’ve got a powerful kigh tucked away in there. It practically grabbed hold of me and drained me dry.” He thumbed the wax stopped off the vial and drank the contents in one long swallow. “Much better,” he pronounced, standing. “Now then, let’s have a look at that eye.”
Pjerin allowed his head to be pushed gently around to the right. “How long?” he asked.
“How long what?” Damek muttered, peeling up the swollen lid and peering beneath it.
“How long will it take to heal?”
“What? Your ribs? Oh, a week. Maybe two. Nothing we do is entirely instantaneous no matter what people think. Now then …” He pulled back enough so that Pjerin could see a reassuring smile. “… this may hurt a bit as well, but it should take the swelling down enough for you to use the eye. Fortunately, there doesn’t appear to be any internal damage. Try not to jerk your head away.”
The warning came a second too late, but the healer’s grip was surprisingly strong. Pjerin felt as though his face were held in a warm vise while someone skewered left brow and cheek with a red-hot needle. Then it was gone. Breathing heavily, he blinked and found he was using both eyes.
Damek patted his shoulder apologetically. “Sorry. I guess you can see why most people with minor injuries tend to have us clean them up and then they let them heal on their own.”
“And I’m not most people?”
“Not really. No.” To cover his embarrassment, Damek ducked his head and closed up his bag.
“They’re healing me to send me to the block.”
“Yes. Well.” The healer shrugged. “No reason to die in pain.”
Pjerin sighed. “No,” he said bitterly, “I suppose not.”
“Do you want a priest sent in? To talk to?”
“No. Thank you.”
Damek sighed, picked up his bag, and called for the guard. Then he paused in the open doorway. “If they offer you a chance to bathe before Judgment, I suggest you take it. It’s amazing how being clean will help.”
“With dying?” Pjerin laughed, a short harsh bark that held no humor. He turned and glowered at both healer and guard. “I broke no oaths. I am not a traitor.”
The guard spat into the cell. Damek shook his head sadly and walked out of sight. The door swung closed, the iron bolt that held it hissing against iron brackets as it slid home.
* * * *
“You’re going where?”
“To the Judgment.”
“Are you out of your mind?” Stasya leaped up from her chair, and ran around Annice to block the door, harp dangling from one outstretched hand. “What if His Majesty sees you?”
Annice frowned. “His Majesty will have enough on his mind without trying to figure out who’s up on the bards’ balcony.”
“But suppose he does look up? What then?”
She shrugged. “He’ll see a bard.”
“Annice, you’re his sister. I don’t care how long it’s been since he’s treated you like one, you’re not exactly an unfamiliar face!”
“Every bard in Elbasan will be there, Stas. He won’t notice me.”
Stasya sat her harp down and crossed her arms. “Great plan. Except that there’s bugger all bards in Elbasan right now. They’re all out Walking.”
“All right.” Annice sighed and shoved a fistful of her robe for inspection. “What color is this?”
Stasya’s eyes narrowed but, uncertain of where Annice was leading the argument, she answered. “Brown.”
“And why is it brown?”
“Because you’re Singing earth now.”
“And what color is my robe usually?”
“You mean the nonfestival robe you never wear? It’s quartered. So what?”
“So if His Majesty does look up, he’ll see a bard in a brown robe. I’m sure he knows I wear a quartered robe. He’ll therefore have no reason to take a closer look. Will he?”
“This is really stupid.”
“Stas, I’m going to go. Whether you like it or not.”
And she was, too. Stasya recognized her expression and, short of physical restraints, could see no way to stop her. “Fine. Hang on till I get dressed. I’m going with you.”
* * * *
“I hate this sort of thing,” Theron muttered, tugging at the high, embroidered collar wrapped about his throat.
Although she knew he referred to the upcoming Judgment and not his clothing, Lilyana reached up and adjusted the clasps. His Majesty’s valet could deal with her later.
He caught her hand. She returned the pressure of his fingers, then pulled free.
“Majesty?” The page bowed in the open doorway. “They’re ready now.”
Theron nodded and squared his shoulders under the folds of heavy black velvet. The king was responsible for every sentence of death passed in Shkoder. There’d been a hundred and twenty since he’d taken the crown ten years before; four other attempts at treason, but most of them men and women who’d committed crimes so terrible that removing them became a necessary surgery for the greater good. Carrying them all, Theron walked slowly out to pick up the weight of the hundred and twenty-first.
* * * *
Although the gleaming wooden benches in the bards’ balcony weren’t known for comfort, Annice sagged against the high back with a sigh of relief. She was finding it more and more difficult to negotiate such things as steep, narrow, spiral staircases—around and around and around on tiny wedge-shaped steps, unable to see her feet, the curve of her bulk barely fitting within the curve of the stone.
“What’s wrong with stairs in straight lines?” she hissed at Stasya as the other bard sank down beside her.
“Spiral staircases take up less room,” Stasya reminded her absently, gaze sweeping the crowds assembling below.
Annice sniffed. “That’d mean a lot more if I was taking up less room.” She settled back and looked around. The last time she’d been on this balcony, she’d been one of the fledglings touring the parameters of their new lives. She hadn’t been back in the ten years since. It seemed smaller than her memory of it.
Cut into the wall on the narrow end of the Great Assembly Hall, high above and behind the right side of throne, the balcony could hold a dozen bards comfortably and twice that if comfort was disallowed. At the moment, it held only Stasya and Annice.
“I guess no one else cared enough to come,” Annice growled, uncertain as to why she was so angry about it. If every bard in Shkoder had crammed onto the balcony, Pjerin would still be condemned to die.
“It’s First Quarter,” Stasya reminded her. “Every bard who can Sing is out Walking. Stay tucked up against the pillar. It’ll block the angle of view from the throne if His Majesty does happen to glance up.”
“I can’t see as well from behind the pillar.”
“And you can’t be seen as well either,” Stasya pointed out, shoving her so that she slid sideways over the polished wood and into the partially hidden position. “Please stay there.”
Because it meant so much to Stasya—but only because it meant so much to Stasya—Annice gritted her teeth and decided to be gracious.
Down below, the thirty-two members of the Governing Council were filing in. Dressed in somber black, they moved quietly to stand before the two rows of wood and leather chairs set up at right angles to the throne. Annice recognized a few of them; they’d been on the Council in her father’s day and had been passed down from reign to reign, their hard work and experience remaining in the service of Shkoder.
When all thirty-two had taken their places, a pair of guards in full ceremonial armor threw open the huge double doors at the other end of the Great Assembly Hall and the public surged in. This was an innovation of her brother’s. Although the common courts had always been open, Royal Judgments had not as their royal father would have rather passed Judgment in a sheepfold than in front of his subjects. Newly a bard, Annice had listened to the criers call King Theron’s first proclamation with amazement.
“Neither Death nor Mercy should come in secret. Any who wish to keep silent witness in the Death Judgment of Hermina i’Jelen to present themselves, weaponless, at the Citadel Gate tomorrow at noon.”
Yesterday, the criers had called for those who wished to keep silent witness for Pjerin a’Stasiek, Duc of Ohrid.
Well, here I am. She laced her fingers into a protective barrier between her baby and the room below. Here we are. Although it was far from hot, damp patches spread out from under both arms.
A solid wall of bodies pressed up against the low wooden barricade that kept the citizens of Elbasan from spilling over into the actual area of the court. Neither as solemn nor as quiet as the Council, they were anxious to see this Duc of Ohrid—who’d intended to have them slaughtered in an unequal war—get the traitor’s death he deserved.
Annice could feel the anger rising off of them, could almost see it beating against the molded plaster ceiling like a great black kigh. Heart pounding, she hoped Pjerin would be safe, that the anger wouldn’t catch him up and dash him down in pieces. Then she called herself four kinds of fool because he’d be safe only to die.
Suddenly, the Bardic Captain stood before the throne. Instead of her quartered robe, she also wore black, her short hair like a cap of polished steel above it. Slowly, she swept her gaze over the huge room and where it touched, silence fell and spread. At last, she nodded and stepped to one side, her voice falling equally on every ear. “His Majesty, Theron, King of Shkoder, High Captain of the Broken Islands, Lord over the Mountain Principalities of Sibiu, Ohrid, Ajud, Bicaz, and Somes.”
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