Once In a Blue Moon (20 page)

Once, the Standing Stone had been worshipped. It still had a definite sense of presence, and power. There were even those who had been heard to murmur that there was something living, sleeping, inside the Stone. An old pagan god, or a devil, depending on which stories you listened to. Richard studied the Standing Stone thoughtfully.

“When I am King, I will have this ugly thing dragged down and broken up with hammers.”

“Hush,” Peter said immediately. “It might be listening.”

“I don’t like it, and I don’t trust it,” Prince Richard said stubbornly.

“But there are any number of old songs about how important the Standing Stone is!” said Clarence, just a bit excitedly. “Some say an ancient hero lies sleeping inside the Stone, waiting to come forth in the Land’s hour of need!”

“Then where was he during the Demon War?” said Richard, and no one had an answer for that.

Richard turned his gaze to the Forest Castle, filling most of the huge clearing and casting its great shadow over the farthest boundaries. To the casual eye, the Castle’s exterior wasn’t actually all that impressive. The stone was everywhere cracked and pitted, and stained from long exposure to wind and rain and passing Time. Wide mats of crawling ivy and a great undulating sea of slate grey roof tiles. Many of the tall crenellated towers had a battered, lopsided look. Crumbling battlements presided over outer walls some three to four feet thick, still standing firm against wars and demons and the endless years. Guarding the Royal line as they guarded the Forest Land.

Thousands of rooms in four great wings, along with halls and galleries, libraries and armouries, servants’ quarters and stables and courtyards . . . Much of it empty now, of course. Dusty, deserted rooms, full of shadows and memories. Not even any ghosts. Because what’s the point of a haunting, if there’s no one to haunt?

Richard sat on his horse, ignoring the quiet impatience of his friends, just . . . looking. All around him the woods were full of life and movement and birdsong. A relief and a comfort after his experience in the Darkwood. There was no way he could have known that such a brief exposure could affect him and his friends so deeply. Neither he nor Clarence nor Peter was comfortable during the night now, though none of them would admit it, let alone discuss it with the others. They all just quietly accepted that they had to have a large banked fire burning before they could go to sleep, a fire big enough to last through the whole night. So its light would still be there if they happened to wake before morning. Like they were children again.

With good reason to be afraid of the dark.

Richard urged his horse forward, out of the woods and across the clearing, and Peter and Clarence were quickly there at his sides. Forest Castle loomed before them, growing steadily larger and more impressive the closer they got. When they finally crossed the ancient moat surrounding the Castle, Richard had to admit he was a little surprised to discover that the drawbridge was already down and waiting for them. Even though no guards were visible on duty anywhere. Had someone seen them coming? Normally you had to stand on the far side of the moat and yell your head off, and wait for someone to notice you. Wise people packed lunches for the wait. It was hard to find good help these days. The horses’ hooves were loud and carrying on the quiet, as they clattered across the drawbridge. Richard looked down into the dark and murky waters of the moat. It needed cleaning out again, but that was expensive. Richard’s attitude was that if some enemy should happen to fall in and be poisoned before he could drown, that was fine by him.

Back in Prince Rupert’s time, a terrible monster had lived in the moat and guarded it against all comers. (The moat used to contain crocodiles, until the day something arrived and ate all the crocodiles, then took up residence in the moat amid the general feeling that if it could eat a moat full of crocodiles, it could certainly guard the Castle.) There was even a popular and very vulgar song about the day the monster and its mate and its many horrible offspring suddenly up and left, some fifty years ago. A very impressive sight, and quite a spectacle, as long as you weren’t standing too close to the moat when it happened.

Prince Richard rode his horse into the great open courtyard, ready to yell his head off for a groom and a dismount; and then he sat very still as he saw the Seneschal emerge from the main Castle entrance and head straight for him, accompanied by rather a lot of armed guards. Someone had seen him coming and arranged this reception for him.

“Run!” said Peter. “We’ll block their way!”

“Escape while you still can!” said Clarence.

“You think you’re so funny,” said Prince Richard. “Where would I go?”

He swung down out of the saddle and threw the reins to Peter. The Seneschal crashed to a halt before the Prince, and the two men looked each other over in silence. They’d known each other all their lives, and the experience had not been a happy one. The Seneschal was King Rufus’ most senior servant, and he liked to give himself airs. On the grounds that he did all the real work in running the Castle. To be fair, he did. The Seneschal was a tall and slender, almost spindly man in his early forties, with a long face and a high forehead, under thinning grey hair. (He liked to blame this on the stress and strain of having to deal with the Royal line, up close and personal, every day.) He wore dark, formal, slightly old-fashioned clothes of a reserved and sombre nature. Including exquisitely tailored gloves and shiny shiny hook-and-eye boots. He tried for a calm and even dour presence when dealing with the Prince, but he nearly always descended into red-faced spluttering. Richard usually felt guilty about teasing the man afterwards. But not enough to stop doing it.

The Seneschal glared at Prince Richard as though he’d been waiting to talk to him for some time and wasn’t at all happy about it.

“You said you were just
popping out for a quick ride
, your highness!” the Seneschal said loudly. “That was two months ago!”

“Well, if I’d told you it was going to be that long, you wouldn’t have let me go, would you?” said the Prince reasonably.

The Seneschal started to say something cutting and obviously much rehearsed, and then stopped and looked the Prince over more carefully.

“What the hell happened to you? Your clothes are torn, I can see dried bloodstains, and there’s a scar down the left side of your face that definitely wasn’t there when you left! You look . . . like you’ve had the shit kicked out of you. Tell me you haven’t gone back to fighting on the border again.”

“I haven’t been fighting on the border again,” said Prince Richard.

“Good . . .”

“I’ve been fighting kobolds down in a mine at Cooper’s Mill.”

The Seneschal looked like he wanted to spit. “God give me strength . . . You can’t keep doing this, your highness! It isn’t . . . Look, we really don’t have time for this. Things have changed in your unauthorised absence. Suddenly and dramatically. You have to come with me right now, to discuss things with your father.”

Richard looked back at Peter and Clarence, who both nodded understandingly and steered their horses towards the stables, taking Richard’s horse with them. Richard looked thoughtfully at the armed guards and then back at the Seneschal.

“Why the heavily armed escort? Anyone would think you didn’t trust me to come with you.”

“How well we know each other,” said the Seneschal.

“I’m really not going to enjoy this meeting, am I?”

“Do you ever?”

“What is this all about, Seneschal?”

“You have to discuss that with your father, your highness.”

“How is he today?” said Richard.

“Average,” said the Seneschal.

Richard winced. “As bad as that? Oh, very well; let’s get on with it. What does my father want to see me about? Does he even know?”

“I think it’s better if I wait till I’ve got you and your father together in the same place,” said the Seneschal. “Then I won’t have to explain things twice. Do I really need these soldiers to accompany us, or will you give me your word not to run off, so I can dismiss them?”

“You have my word,” said Richard. “I know my duty. And I’m just too tired to go chasing up and down corridors.”

“Either you’re finally developing some maturity or those kobolds really did a number on you,” said the Seneschal.

“Guess,” said Richard.

“Maturity,” said the Seneschal. “I’m looking forward to it.”

•   •   •

T
he Seneschal led Prince Richard through the pleasant and even cosy corridors of Forest Castle, where a surprisingly large number of people had turned out to wave and smile and welcome the Prince home. Richard regarded them all suspiciously, and looked at the Seneschal, who reluctantly admitted that news of the Prince’s heroic actions at Cooper’s Mill had got back to the Castle long before the Prince did. The details were sometimes blurred, and often contradictory, about exactly what it was he’d done, but everyone agreed it had all been very heroic. Peter and Clarence didn’t even get a mention. Lords and Ladies called out congratulations and compliments to Richard as he passed, and he just smiled and nodded and kept up a great pace so he wouldn’t have to stop and answer questions. The Lords and Ladies of Forest Castle only ever wanted to talk to the Prince when they were after something. The Seneschal frowned darkly, until he just couldn’t stand it any longer.

“You know you’re not supposed to go riding off without a proper armed escort, your highness! You have no right to place your Royal life in danger!”

“It’s my life, Seneschal,” the Prince said mildly.

“No, it isn’t! Your life belongs to the Kingdom. What if you’d been attacked by brigands? Or kidnapped? If those kobolds had killed you, how would you have married the Princess Catherine and finally brought peace to both our nations?”

“Peter would have held me up, Clarence would have managed the responses through ventriloquism, and everything would have gone ahead as planned,” said Prince Richard.

“I don’t know why I bother,” said the Seneschal.

“I don’t either,” said Richard.

They finally left the crowds behind, to their mutual relief, and made their way to King Rufus’ private quarters, deep in the old heart of the original Castle structure. The Seneschal looked sharply at the two ceremonial guards standing duty outside the King’s door (their main duty was to go with the King whenever he went out, and then bring him safely back again), and the two guards immediately snapped to attention. The Seneschal and the Prince sighed, pretty much in unison. The Seneschal knocked loudly on the door, pushed it open, and led the way in.

The receiving room was a mess; official papers and leather-bound books were piled up everywhere, along with half-eaten meals and even a few items of dirty laundry. Bits and pieces from various eras of Castle history that the King had sent for because he had a vague feeling they might come in handy and then forgot about. Chairs were full and tables were overloaded, and a bottle of really good champagne had been opened and then just left to go flat. The air smelled close and fusty, because the King hadn’t opened a window in quite a while. In fact, half the windows still had their curtains closed, blocking out the morning light and shedding a palpable gloom over the whole room.

When Richard’s mother, Queen Jane, was still alive, she kept the King’s private rooms spotless. A place for everything and everything in its place. She organised regular dustings and always had vases of freshly cut flowers sitting about where they could do the most good. King Rufus went along with it all happily enough, but after his wife died . . . Rufus stopped caring about a lot of things. The Seneschal kept sending servants in to clean the King’s rooms, and the King kept driving them out again, because, he said, he knew where everything was and he didn’t want it disturbed.

Richard always thought that the state of the King’s private rooms indicated the state of the King’s thoughts. Dark and gloomy and cluttered, and just a bit lost. When King Rufus was feeling relatively together, he would try to make an effort. Read some of the more important papers that came his way. And at least on those days, the mess did seem to make some kind of sense. Richard looked around the state of the receiving room, and his heart sank. It was clearly not a good day.

King Rufus came shuffling into the room from his private study next door, muttering querulously to himself, and wandered around picking things up and putting them down again. It was obvious he was looking for something, but as usual he couldn’t remember what. Though he would never admit that, even to himself. Rufus was in his seventies, hard worn and worn down, and his mind had been deteriorating ever since Queen Jane died. Some days he didn’t remember she was dead, and would ask quite innocently where she was. No one ever told him. It would have been cruel. The servants knew he’d soon forget again, so they just told him she was in the next room. And Rufus would smile and nod and go about whatever he remembered of his business.

King Rufus had been a tall and sturdy man in his prime, a warrior of much renown, but now he was hunched over and half his proper weight, because he kept forgetting to eat. His still noble head thrust forward, with its great mane of snow white hair, and he sported a full white beard, because no one wanted him trying to shave. He always seemed a kindly enough soul, with a smile for everyone, particularly if he wasn’t sure whether he was supposed to know them. Today he was wearing his usual threadbare and battered old robes, which he clung to fiercely because they were familiar. His feet were bare. The Seneschal always dressed the King in his ceremonial best every time Rufus had to appear in public, and he would sit quietly while the Seneschal fussed over him and put his crown on. Rufus still remembered about duty and responsibility, even if he did have to have them and what they had to do with him explained to him.

Rufus looked around furtively as he realised he had company. He pottered around for a while, clearly hoping they’d get bored and go away, but when it became clear that wasn’t going to happen, the King stopped and sighed. He looked Richard and the Seneschal over with a cautious, almost defiant gaze. He wanted to be sure he knew who they were before he committed himself to saying anything. He still had clear steel grey eyes and a firm mouth; but it had to be said that he had a lost and defeated look to him most days now. Rufus had been a great King in his time, wise and brave and dignified. He did a lot to ease the transition from Royalty to Parliament, because he believed in it and considered it in the best interests of the Forest Land. But that was then, and this was now. King Rufus’ mind was going, and it seemed to Richard that every day a little bit less remained of the man his father had been.