The Amber Legacy (28 page)

‘No. Just Meg, please. No “my lady” required.’

‘Yes, my—Meg,’ Spring answered uncomfortably. ‘I’ll have your dirty clothes washed and mended. I’ll also prepare a nightshirt for you, and in the morning I will have fresh clothes ready for your meeting with Her Majesty.’

Meg thanked Spring, feeling both excited and uneasy at having a complete stranger wait on her—in the Queen’s palace. She hadn’t dreamed of anything like this. She stripped off her travelling clothes and tested the water temperature.

‘Is it warm enough, or too hot?’ Spring asked, gathering Meg’s discarded clothes.

‘It’s perfect. It smells like—I don’t know.’

‘Lavender blossom. I always put a little lavender blossom essence in my bath. Do you like it, my la—Meg?’

‘Yes,’ Meg replied. She climbed into the deep bath, sinking gratefully into the soothing water. She’d bathed in the river, and washed in the basin on the farm, but she’d never been in a bath, and although the Archers had a small tin bath in their inn for travellers, Meg hadn’t experienced such luxury. She heard the door open and close as Spring carried away her clothes. She scrubbed the dirt from her arms and legs and body, and her face, feeling clean for the first time since leaving home, and she relaxed into the warmth. The chamber door opened and closed again, and Spring placed fresh clothing on the bed. She approached the bath and stood behind Meg, saying, ‘I’ll wash your hair for you.’

Later, snuggled into the soft sheets and warm, heavy blankets of the huge bed, Meg was so relaxed from the bath and exhausted from the journey that she hardly heard Spring drawing the curtains or her parting goodnight. She wrapped herself in the luxurious comfort of her fresh, clean black nightdress and fell asleep.

W
ake up!
It was a strange dream, she thought, to imagine feelings in her head, but not to see anything.
Wake up
! She opened her eyes carefully. Apart from red embers in the fireplace, everything was black. Where was she? Then she remembered. The palace.
Run!
There was a weight at the end of her bed, by her feet. She heard a soft footfall. Someone cried, ‘Ow!’ and swore.
Run!
The feeling was overwhelming. Meg threw aside the blankets, but as she swung her legs out a weight smashed against her. She was subsumed by the strong stench of humanity—sweat and pungent warmth—and a body on top of her. ‘Got the bitch!’ a man harshly whispered. A sharp punch stunned her with a burst of pain across her left cheek and lips. Her assailant’s body jerked, his knee digging into her leg, and he swore profusely as he writhed and rolled off.

‘What the fuck?’ a second voice demanded.

‘Get this fucking thing off me!’ yelled the man on the floor. ‘Get it off!’

Free, Meg scrambled to her feet and ran towards the glowing embers. Where could she run? She wrenched a brass poker from its hanging place and wheeled to face
her attackers. There were guards at her door. ‘Help!’ she screamed. ‘Help!’

‘Shut the bitch up!’ ordered a man in the darkness.

‘Help me!’ she screamed frantically. Where were the guards? Out of the darkness came a man, the dull red glow catching his dagger’s keen edge. Meg desperately adopted the fighting stance Blade had taught her, holding the poker like a sword, but when she saw the man’s face in the glow, her heart sank. He was one of the young soldiers meant to be guarding her. Behind him, she saw another shape approaching.

‘Give it up, lady,’ the soldier said. ‘No one is coming to save you.’

She crouched, summoning all of her flagging courage. ‘I know how to fight.’

The soldier grinned grimly. ‘Of course you do,’ he said cynically, and moved closer, rolling his dagger in his hand. In the red glow, his face looked cruel. There was a blur of black across his face and he yelled and fell backwards. ‘Get it off!’ he shouted, as he thrashed around. His companion lunged to the floor to wrestle with the screaming soldier, but he also started thrashing and screaming.

The first soldier staggered to his feet, clutching his throat, dark liquid oozing between his fingers. Horrified, rooted to the spot, Meg watched the man stumble towards her. As he reached out with bloodied hands, she swung the poker with all her strength and struck him viciously across the face. He staggered back, and she hit him again and again, until he collapsed onto his back. Dropping the poker with a clatter onto the floor, she kicked the outstretched arm of the second man as he attempted to grab her, and fled through the dark chamber. Opening the door, she ran into the semidark hall screaming, ‘Help!’ and headed for the junction at the top of the stairs, expecting to find
guards on duty. When she discovered that none were, she descended the marble stairs and sprinted along the entrance hall, past the towering paintings of the ancestors of the Royal line. As she reached the end, a door opened to her left and yellow light spilled across the floor. In the doorway, holding a small lantern, was the Intermediary, still in his black uniform. ‘By Jarudha’s Word, my lady, what is wrong?’ he asked, his face screwed up in alarm.

‘In my bedroom!’ she gasped desperately. ‘Men! They tried to kill me.’

The Intermediary strode past her into the hall, bellowing, ‘Guards!’ He repeated the call. Doors along the corridor swung open and soldiers appeared, pulling on jerkins and buckling swords. ‘Follow me at once!’ he ordered, and he ran up the stairs with thirty soldiers in train, leaving Meg in the long, cold hall, dabbing at her bruised and bloodied cheek and lips.

‘Her Majesty is most alarmed that you were attacked within the palace,’ the Intermediary explained, as he ushered Meg along the main hall towards the Queen’s Counsel Chamber. ‘The two men were specially trained for their role to protect guests to the palace, so I am personally very perplexed and embarrassed by what has happened.’

She walked beside the tall, neatly groomed man, listening as he apologised, but she was taking in the main hall’s lavish furnishings and the multitude of doors leading from it. The aubergine-coloured walls were adorned with tapestries and myriad paintings of all styles—some bright and airy, others sombre and tragic—representing historical events, portraits and romanticised moments. She stopped at one enormous tapestry that spanned the full wall between two doors. Frayed, worn, the colours severely faded,
ancient in every way, its images still revealed a strange battle. At its centre was an armoured warrior sweeping a flaming sword through the neck of a lizard-like creature she assumed represented a dragon. More dragons circled in the background above a scene of carnage. ‘Is something wrong, my lady?’ the Intermediary asked.

She blinked, and shook her head. ‘No. Just a curious picture.’

‘Ah, yes. This particular tapestry dates back more than a thousand years, according to the scholars, perhaps even longer. Its origins are unknown, even to how it came to be among the old kings’ collections. People’s imaginations were vivid in antiquity. They portrayed dragons as real creatures, although our scholars now know that they were merely pictorial metaphors for the political, social and religious struggles the old kings and their societies faced. Quaint concept, really.’

Meg nodded, only partly comprehending the Intermediary’s babble. She was adrift in her memory of the dream in which a young warrior, like the one in the tapestry, fought a dragon from his castle battlements. How had she dreamed what she had never before seen?

‘My lady?’ The Intermediary took her arm. ‘Her Majesty is waiting.’

She let her thoughts go and moved on. Meeting the Queen was feeling bizarre. The clothes Spring organised for her to wear were even more bizarre. She was made to wear—‘made’ because she was offered no alternative—a full-length, dark green silk dress that billowed at her waist and was cut low at the breast—lower than Meg would have liked. ‘I don’t normally wear dresses,’ she told Spring, when the girl first showed her what had been chosen.

Spring’s face registered astonishment. ‘This colour will look stunning against your red hair, my lady. It’s so flattering a style too.’ Meg acquiesced, letting Spring dress her, feeling naked around her legs without the security of trousers. Whisper sat on the bed, watching the act of dressing with rat curiosity, much to Spring’s chagrin, which was exacerbated when Meg asked Spring to look after Whisper while she had the audience with the Queen. ‘As my lady wishes,’ Spring obediently replied, but her tone conveyed her disgust for the task.

‘She saved my life last night,’ Meg told her.

‘There!’ Spring declared, when the dressing was complete. ‘My lady, you are beautiful!’ She circled Meg and showed her what she looked like in a full-length mirror, another device that fascinated Meg. No one used mirrors in Summerbrook. ‘You should grow your hair longer, my lady,’ Spring suggested. Meg didn’t have the heart to tell her that her hair
had
been much longer, or that it had also been severely shorter. The image in the mirror surprised her. Like everyone else, she saw for the first time a beautiful young woman—slender, fine-featured. Only the green dress looked wrong. And there was the nagging thought that her slender shape was fast to become rounded with a swollen belly.

The main hall ended at a formidable double door constructed from dark wood banded with iron. Above the doors hung a black pennant with the Queen’s insignia. Four fully armoured soldiers with body-length shields, longswords and crossbows stood on guard: their armour and weaponry black and the shields emblazoned with the royal golden serpent. ‘The Queen’s Elite Guards,’ the Intermediary announced. He bowed to the Guards who also bowed, and two promptly swung the great doors open. A trumpet sounded a short note as they entered.

Built to impress ambassadors and visiting kings, Meg gasped as she entered the Queen’s Counsel Chamber. From the outside she’d seen that the palace had four storeys, but she hadn’t expected to enter a room where the ceiling extended three full storeys as this one did. The ceiling was a huge dome of coloured glass depicting a serene face shrouded by rays of golden light. ‘Jarudha,’ the Intermediary whispered. ‘He watches over everything, and His light illuminates the path to reason.’ At each level, a balcony ran around the walls and Guards were stationed at strategic points. ‘Those are the flags of each of Her Majesty’s Tithe Lords,’ the Intermediary explained, pointing to the long banners that hung from the top balcony, eight in total. With heraldic symbols, and against the background structure of white marble, the banners were dramatic splashes of colour. Though square in overall design, the chamber was divided octagonally. Three walls and each corner contained an alcove, and each alcove housed eight black upholstered chairs set in two rows of four. The end wall was curved into a larger alcove with five marble steps leading to a single stately golden throne, also padded in black with gold serpents embedded in the seat and back. The central floor had nine rows of chairs facing the throne alcove, each row curved to ensure everyone could see the throne clearly, and an aisle divided the centre with a strip of black and gold carpet stretching from the entry to the base of the five marble steps.

On the throne was a woman dressed in a sleeveless black gown, with her blonde hair piled high on her head. To each side stood two Queen’s Elite Guards. One step down from the throne there were two Seers in sky blue robes, and a variety of men and women, dressed in Royal black, filled the front row of chairs. ‘Her Majesty has honoured you with a private
audience,’ the Intermediary informed Meg as he led her along the carpet towards the throne. The audience stood and applauded as she entered the space between the front row and the marble steps, and the Queen rose, also clapping. ‘Your most Royal Majesty!’ the Intermediary announced, stopping Meg politely with his outstretched arm. ‘It is my personal honour to present Lady Meg Farmer of Summerbrook, whose exploits have contributed to the safety of your sovereign rule and humbled the best of our soldiers.’ He bowed low, straightened, and took a step to one side.

‘So you are the girl who slew Marchlord Treasure Overbrook?’ the Queen asked. Her neck and fingers sparkled with gems and jewellery, and across her forehead was a thick, wide gold band studded with black gems.

‘I didn’t actually kill him,’ Meg replied cautiously, uncertain of what she should say or how she should say it.

Queen Sunset smiled, and descended the steps. ‘Well it seems stories have a habit of growing in stature in the telling.’ She stopped on the lowest step. ‘Perhaps you should tell me what really happened.’

The Queen was a similar height to her mother, and she wondered if she remained on the last step to avoid appearing significantly shorter than her tall guest. She assembled her thoughts quickly, choosing which details of her part in the Battle of The Whispering Forest she should include and which to avoid. ‘I was just lucky,’ she replied. ‘Treasure—the blue knight—left a chance for me to strike with my dagger. I don’t know how or why it went through his armour. It just did. That’s all I remember.’

‘A modest warrior,’ the Queen said, nodding. ‘Your story was brought to me by two people when I wanted to know the name of the unknown soldier who had
turned the tide of war so dramatically. They told me what they’d seen and who you were, so I thought it would be appropriate for a hero to be rewarded. But I’ve since learned something else about you, Meg Farmer. It seems you are much, much more than you pretend.’

Meg shifted uncomfortably. ‘I don’t understand.’ The Queen motioned to a Seer with her left hand, an older man with white hair and a long beard, and he descended to stand beside Meg. He closed his eyes and concentrated, and when he opened them he said, ‘You have Jarudha’s Blessing.’

The Queen smiled again, and continued. ‘You know Leader Cutter. You met Marchlord Strong after the battle. They both confirmed who you were and what you did at the Battle of The Whispering Forest. This is why I sent for you. But last night we learned of stranger events. You healed Leader Westridge when he was dying. And now someone is determined to have you killed.’ She shifted her attention briefly to the Intermediary, and Meg saw a flicker of anger in the woman’s blue eyes, before she looked again at Meg. ‘I sincerely apologise for what happened last night. My palace should be the safest place for anyone to rest, but it seems security needs a serious overhaul.’ She glanced at the Intermediary again, but Meg noticed that he seemed unruffled by the Queen’s displeasure. ‘For your safety in the immediate future, I have assigned five of my personal Elite Guards to accompany you and to protect your chamber.’ She turned and climbed the steps to her throne and then faced the small audience. ‘There will be a public procession to celebrate our new hero in three days, on Praise Day. On that day, I will award Lady Meg an honorary title of Marchlord, and she will be given a perpetual tithe from Tithe Lord Whitetree’s region, encompassing her home village and surrounding
lands. In the meantime, Lady Meg will reside in the palace as my guest, and she will spend her time with Seer Diamond as her guide.’ The Queen sat, and the small assembly of people applauded again.

The Seer touched Meg’s arm, and said, ‘If you would accompany me, my lady?’ and he led her from the Queen’s Counsel Chamber.