by Roger Taylor
'Honoured Secretary,’ she said, somewhat regretfully, seeing no way to avoid the almost inevitable outcome. Dilrap started and looked round suddenly. The abrupt movement dislodged a large scroll from the middle of the pile he was carrying.
Slowly it started to unroll. Dilrap's eyes widened and a quiver ran through him preparatory to a reflexive lunge after the escaping document. The quiver ended in a violent twitching as his hand groped blindly underneath his load in a vain attempt to stop the accelerating scroll, while his chin clawed frantically at the top of the pile to steady an ominous sway that had begun to develop in the whole stack.
Sylvriss watched spellbound as the saga unfolded itself in front of her with the predestined order of a classical tragedy.
The chin triumphantly trapped the topmost document and stopped the incipient sway, but the middle of the stack bellied forward, intent on explosive self-destruction. Chin clinging valiantly and hand flailing futilely for the lost scroll which was now laying a paper pathway along the corridor, Dilrap took a step forward as if to overtake the swelling bulge. Malevolently, his father's robe chose this time to embrace his feet and, with a woeful cry, Dilrap rolled to the floor amidst the fluttering shower that had been his charge.
Hitching her hood forward again and biting her lip to stop herself from laughing, Sylvriss bent forward and picked up some of the nearer scrolls and papers.
'Majesty, Majesty,’ cried Dilrap, his alarm intensifying as he scrabbled on all fours to relieve his monarch's consort of this servant's work.
Sylvriss held out a hand to help him, but he affected not to see it and struggled to his feet unaided, only narrowly avoiding pulling down a velvet curtain and dislodging a carved head from a pedestal.
'Dilrap,’ said Sylvriss sympathetically.
'Majesty,’ Dilrap repeated, looking around at the debris and gesticulating vaguely. Sylvriss tossed back the hood of her robe and smiled gently at him. Dilrap was destroyed. He was so fond of his Queen. He grieved constantly for her suffering, and admired beyond words her steadfast courage. She was one of the few who called him by his name. Most used his title and even made that sound like an insult. She made him feel calm and at ease. And she was so beautiful. So beautiful.
She was fond of him too. He reminded her of a fat old pony she had had as a child, but she sensed other qualities in the man, and she too quietly grieved for his plight.
'I'm sorry I startled you, Dilrap,’ she said. ‘But I wanted to speak to you about something.’ She gestured to a passing servant and gave orders for the papers to be collected and taken to Dilrap's office then, taking his elbow, she said, ‘Come with me.’ There was a brief flurry of hitchings and adjustments before Dilrap fell in with the sauntering pace of his Queen. She walked for some time without speaking. Dilrap cast surreptitious sideways glances at her. It seemed to him that she was changed in some way. Her face was different—less strained—younger, flushed, even. Then, as if on a whim, she turned off the corridor and, walking through an elaborate archway, came into the Crystal Hall.
Two Mathidrin standing guard at the archway clicked their heels as she passed, and she acknowledged their salute with a nod and a gracious smile. At every opportunity, in every little way, she was determined to ease herself into the affections and respect of all Dan-Tor's minions, however loutish. It would have been easier for her by far to be cold and distant, but that would have been easier for them too. No, she thought, some affection for me amongst his men can do nothing but hinder him and might prove helpful one day. I'll show you how to train horses, you long streak of evil.
The Crystal Hall was so called because of its strange translucent walls and ceilings. They shifted and shimmered constantly with every imaginable colour. Their smooth surfaces were broken only by thin veins of a golden inlay, curling and sweeping into elaborate leaf-like patterns. Somewhere behind each surface could be seen figures and landscapes that seemed to flicker in and out of existence with the slightest movement of the head; sometimes near, sometimes distant.
It was a beautiful place and it exuded tranquillity, but no one knew how or when it had been built, or who had built it. In fact no one now knew even the name of this strange craft of inner carving.
Dan-Tor never visited it.
Sylvriss led Dilrap over to a broad seat underneath the pattern of a huge tree etched out in fine golden threads. These were flush with the surface of the wall, but the inner work made the trunk seem solid and whole, and the branches shimmered as though sunlight were falling on them through waving leaves. A close examination would reveal countless tiny, multi-coloured insects moving among the crevices of the bark. The leaves, too, flickered and shone as if a breeze were blowing through them, and as different seasons shone their different lights into the hall so the leaves seemed to change and fall.
Sylvriss sat down and gestured Dilrap to do likewise. Dilrap did as he was bidden, and folding his hands in his lap awaited his Queen's pleasure.
He had neither the stature not the dignity of his late father, but he had a substantial portion of his considerable intellect and a memory that was superior by far. It was his saving grace as the King's Secretary and prevented life becoming totally intolerable for him. However, this, his real worth, was unknown to most, not least himself, being constantly overshadowed by his circumstances and his excitable and nervous disposition.
In the Queen's company, however, given a little time, he tended to relax and be more at ease, and his truer self would emerge. Perceptively, Sylvriss judged that despite being utterly fearful of Dan-Tor, his loyalty to the King was unquestionable and his devotion to her total.
He was worth more than her humorous affection, she knew. The very contempt in which many of the Court held him meant that secrets which were jealously guarded from other ears were discussed almost openly in his presence. Often, no more heed was taken of him than of one of the Palace hounds. But, Sylvriss noted, he never gossiped. Never sought to protect himself by winning the spurious esteem of others with some display of his knowledge of the intimate details of Palace life. He absorbed all his embarrassment and discomfiture and, presumably, resentment in some inner place. His sole defence was his defencelessness.
The tree shimmered as the sun emerged from behind a cloud and its light burst into the Hall.
'Dilrap,’ she began. ‘I need a friend. An ally.'
'Majesty, I'm your most devo...'
She waved him to silence. ‘No, Dilrap. I need no Court pleasantries from you. I know what you are.’ She stared at him for a moment, then plunged. ‘You're a man trapped by circumstances in a public office for which he considers himself totally unsuitable. Circumstances made all the more bitter by the fact that his father ranked as one of the finest Secretaries any King has ever known.'
Dilrap bowed his head. Sylvriss pressed forward. ‘But your father didn't have a sick and wayward King to deal with, nor...’ She paused significantly, watching him carefully. ‘Nor, Dilrap, did he have to deal with the likes of Lord Dan-Tor.’ She offered no embellishment of her description of Dan-Tor. It was not necessary.
Dilrap looked up and caught her gaze. Strange, came a slow, almost reluctant, thought from deep inside him. Strange that I'd never seen that—that simple, obvious fact. Sylvriss held his gaze and nodded in confirmation of what she had said.
'Your father towers in your life as once he towered in this Palace,’ she said. Then with great deliberation, ‘But no man could have contended with the Lord Dan-Tor. No man.'
Dilrap lowered his eyes again. ‘Majesty, I don't understand what you're saying. What is it you want of me?'
'I want a friend, Dilrap. An ally.'
Dilrap made no reply.
Sylvriss took a deep breath. She must continue now. ‘Dilrap, you underestimate yourself totally. You always have. For anyone who cares to look, there are qualities in you which make you at least as fine a Secretary as your father. The reason your office is burdensome to you, and why you're the butt of so many in the Court, is
that Dan-Tor wishes it so. He wants no one around him or the King who might be intelligent enough to interfere with his plans.'
Dilrap looked alarmed and fluttered his hands nervously, like butterflies trying to fly to safety in the glittering tree above them. ‘Majesty ... I don't know...'
'Dilrap. I know. I know you're loyal to your office and the King. And to the people of Fyorlund. I know it grieves you constantly that you seem to be eternally impotent to alter the terrible course we're set on.’ She seized the dithering hands. Dilrap started. ‘Look at me,’ she said urgently. ‘I tell you again. You must understand. Even your father couldn't have stood against the wiles of Dan-Tor. As sure as fate he'd have been destroyed in the attempt. You must believe that. Somewhere inside you, you know it's true.'
She released the hands and they floated down into his lap again.
'Majesty,’ he whispered, ‘maybe what you say is true. I know that you above all would play no cruel tricks on me. But what do you want of me?'
Sylvriss placed all on one cast and told him briefly and bluntly. ‘The King has no mysterious illness. It was Dan-Tor's treatment that precipitated his condition and it's been Dan-Tor's treatment that has maintained it.’ Dilrap's eyes widened in terror, but Sylvriss continued. ‘See how well he's been recently, now that it's in Dan-Tor's interests not to have him wandering about demented, further complicating the actions he's accidentally set in motion.'
'Majesty,’ ventured Dilrap, ‘the King's illness has always been subject to these brief flashes of normality. He may lapse again at any moment.'
'I know,’ said Sylvriss. Then, with some bitterness, ‘There's a quality in Dan-Tor's potions that makes the body cry out for them desperately, even though they injure it. I've learned that in the past and suffered for it.'
Dilrap raised his hand as if to comfort the pain that passed over the beautiful face.
'But knowledge is a shield, Dilrap,’ Sylvriss continued. ‘Dan-Tor quieted the King and then left his tending to me while he occupied himself with political affairs.’ Her voice fell. ‘Very slowly I've been reducing the strength of the potions I'm supposed to give him.’ She raised a finger in emphasis. ‘Very slowly he's returning to health.'
Dilrap looked round fearfully. ‘Majesty, why do you tell me this? I think the Lord Dan-Tor is capable of anything—anything—I've seen so many...’ He stopped. ‘I shudder to think what his real aims are. But what can I do?'
Sylvriss sat back and nodded slowly. ‘You've just done it, Honoured Secretary. You've spoken the truth. You've seen so many things, you said. So many things that shouldn't be. And even the seemingly unimportant things take their toll—lapses in procedure, appointments for personal favours rather than ability, petty deceits and illegalities to avoid the scrutiny of the Geadrol, trivial things. Trivial things that have accumulated over the years to shift power gradually from where it lay, into Dan-Tor's hands. Reluctant but efficient hands, labouring only in the interests of their monarch.'
Then, surprised at her own realization, 'You've spoken out about it. You've spoken out and been crushed. Long ago. Crushed with the same meticulous attention to detail that he applies to everything. All the ways a man can be crushed without actually breaking his bones. You fought your battle alone, and you thought it lost.'
The last vestiges of her image of her old pony faded in a tearful mist and this time she felt his pain. Dilrap sat motionless, a dark expression on his face as countless scores of humiliations and rebuffs marched in mocking triumph before him.
'What can I do?’ he said again, simply.
'You must do as I must,’ said Sylvriss. ‘You must fight again. But with a new resolve, no matter what the odds, if the things you honour—Kingship, the Law, the people, your father's memory—are to survive. You and I have nowhere left to hide. No one will act against Dan-Tor if we don't. He'll twist the rest of the Lords around his finger, and destroy them one at a time. Then he'll destroy the King and everything else of the old way. Including us.'
'Majesty, I'm not a warrior,’ Dilrap said faintly.
Sylvriss smiled. ‘You're no swordsman, Dilrap, but you're more of a warrior than you know.'
Dilrap tried for the last time to refuse the mantle that was being pressed on him. ‘Majesty, if the King is improving in health, he'll surely be able to take control again. He was a powerful and able man.'
Sylvriss shook her head. ‘Oh, how I wish that were true,’ she said sadly. ‘But he's still far from being fully well again. He's quiet and at some semblance of peace with himself, but his condition isn't stable. He teeters constantly on the edge of one extreme or the other. To mention the Geadrol or the Lords would be to push him over the edge.’ She sighed. ‘Only by keeping his mind on happier times can I keep him calm and give him the time to become stronger.’ Her hands twisted in her lap. ‘Fortunately we've a fine store of such memories...'
Her voice faded.
Dilrap looked at the Queen's hands. They were abruptly anxious and fidgety. The hands of a woman who had been too long waiting for ill news, not the powerful hands of the skilled rider that had just seized his own.
'I'm afraid there's no help to be found from the King. Probably there'll be hindrance. I can't always tell how his moods are going to turn.’ Her mouth made a little ironic twist. ‘You and I will have to stand around him like the High Guards around Ethriss at the Last Battle.'
Despite himself, Dilrap smiled at the analogy. The imagery appealed to the heroic little boy within him that all life's depredations had not yet totally destroyed.
They did not talk for much longer under the glittering tree. This was no time for detailed plotting and scheming. The essence of their compact had been sealed. Now they were allies against a common foe. Both saw clearly as never before that ahead of them lay degradation and possibly worse if they did nothing.
It might be that this would still be the case even if they acted against Dan-Tor, but it was their only hope for an alternative future and, if they failed utterly, then at least they would have that strange consolation of dying facing an enemy rather than fleeing from him.
* * *
Chapter 19
For all their new-found resolve and awareness, the four Lords found their material position unchanged. They did not even know where they were being held except that it was somewhere in the main Palace building and almost certainly underground.
Their journey from the Throne Room following their fateful confrontation with the King had been confined and violent, all four of them shouting and struggling but being relentlessly shepherded by the grim Mathidrin. So unexpected had been the King's action that none of them had had the presence of mind to note where they were going through the maze of corridors and hallways, but their subsequent consensus was that it had been generally downwards. A long way down.
Their food was brought by a series of different guards, and whenever the door was opened, at least two others could be seen standing outside.
'We've set ourselves a fair task, Lords,’ said Eldric with a grim smile. ‘I for one don't feel inclined to match my muscle against what I've seen of our guards. Wherever they're from, they look fit and tough, and we've no idea how many of them are out there.’ Then he catalogued their problems. ‘Even if we do get out of this room we don't know where we are, thanks to our dignified journey here, and if we managed to get out of the Palace there's no saying how many friends we'll find in the City to help us back to our estates.’ His voice had risen with each statement and finally he smacked his hands on his knees and stood up. ‘Good grief, we don't even know whether our estates and High Guards still exist,’ he shouted.
'We abandon the idea?’ asked Arinndier placidly.
Eldric shot his friend a stern glance. ‘Certainly not,’ he said fiercely, before catching the humour in Arinndier's eye.
'We just have to move one step at a time that's all,’ he concluded, more quietly.
Arinndier smiled. Like all of them, Eldric was paler and thinner as
a result of his confinement, but his inner fire seemed to be burning brighter than ever. Occasionally Arinndier felt sparks fly that he had not seen since they fought shoulder to shoulder in the Morlider War. A much younger man had replaced the old one that had so recently been tenanting Eldric's body.
Only once did Eldric refer to his strange decline and recovery. Hreldar and Darek were sleeping and Eldric and Arinndier had fallen into a companionable silence. Arinndier looked at his old friend, pensively tapping a curled finger against his mouth.
'Are you all right?’ he inquired tentatively.
Eldric nodded and smiled after a moment. ‘Yes. I'm fine now, Arin,’ he said. Then he volunteered, ‘I'm afraid age has stiffened me up in more ways than one.'
Arinndier looked at him inquiringly.
Eldric spoke very quietly. ‘When the King turned on us like that, I panicked. Not for an instant had I thought that such a thing could happen. And all those guards closing in on us. So many ... so overwhelming. It's a long time since I've been so frightened.'
'We were all frightened,’ said Arinndier.
Eldric frowned a little and shook his head. ‘No, this wasn't the same. This felt like something breaking inside. Something important that kept me together. Something that would have bent and taken the strain once. It was terrible.’ Briefly, his age showed on his face again, but Arinndier did not interrupt.
'Suddenly it was an end, Arin. All the life seemed to go out of me. I felt lost—like a child—all I wanted to do was bolt for cover, hide in my mother's skirts. Then I was in some kind of darkness. I scarcely remember anything until I heard Darek laying down the law about the Law. You know, I seemed to hear my father shouting at me, “Get up, boy!” And I did. Whatever had broken came together again. Something dropped back into place.'
