The Bitterbynde Trilogy (71 page)

The rarest beauty and the greatest wealth

Are found within the Empire's Royal Court
.

F
ASHIONABLE SONG AT THE
C
OURT OF
C
AERMELOR

Caermelor Palace had originally been constructed as a castle stronghold and still retained its fortified outer structure. Machicolated watchtowers, siege engine towers, stair turrets, a mill tower, round mural towers, square mural towers, and numerous other outjuttings thickened the twelve-foot-deep walls at varying intervals.

The road into the park-like palace grounds crossed the moat by means of a drawbridge. Beyond the drawbridge bulked the garrisoned gatehouse and the barbican. The main outer gate was constructed of solid oak, studded with iron. It could be barred, if necessary, by an iron portcullis that remained raised in times of peace and was lowered only for the purpose of oiling the chains and maintaining the winches.

When this outer gate was shut, persons on foot might enter by a smaller postern set into it, whereupon they would find themselves in a long chamber set within thick walls, with a gate at either end—the gatehouse, a solid edifice specifically dedicated to the purpose of providing a space between the inner and outer portals. Peepholes in the walls allowed guards in side passages to inspect purportedly innocent visitors. Those approved visitors might pass through a second gate. It opened onto the outer bailey, which in recent years had been filled with walled gardens and leafy courtyards. A third gate led to the inner bailey with its stables, barracks, parade grounds, kennels, pigeon-lofts, coach-mews, and falconry-mews. It was bordered by the King's Tower—winged with fluttering standards—the arsenal tower, the Great Hall with its pentise, two tall Mooring Masts, the solar, and the keep. The windows of the internal buildings had been enlarged from cross-slitted arrow-loops and narrow arches to gracious fenestrations of latticed glass, and greater opulence reigned within them than in former days. The transformation from fortress castle to residential palace had also involved the creation of ornamental gardens around the keep.

Somewhere within the vitals of that keep, Tamlain Conmor, the Most Noble the Duke of Roxburgh, Marquess of Carterhaugh, Earl of Miles Cross, Baron Oakington-Hawbridge, and Lord High Field-Marshal of the Dainnan—to name only his principal titles—strode into the richly furnished suite he always occupied when at Court, calling for his junior valet and his squire.

‘Ho, John! Where is my lady wife?'

‘The Duchess Alys-Jannetta is at her bower with her ladies, Your Grace,' piped the valet.

‘So. Have you laid out some clean clouts for the evening?'

‘The scarlet hose or the puce, Your Grace?'

‘I care not, just as long as they are serviceable enough that they don't split along the crotch seam and let my backside hang out. Wilfred, is Conquest well-polished?'

‘Conquest is oiled and polished, sir,' replied that young man.

‘Give him here.' The Dainnan Chieftain stroked the broadsword lovingly; held it up to the light.

‘Good.' He handed the weapon back to his squire. ‘See that the new scabbard is maintained as bravely. Who's that at my door? Enter.'

A footman opened the sitting-room door. A messenger ran in, went down on one knee before the warrior and bowed, offering a silver salver on which a leaf of parchment flapped. Roxburgh read the note, scratching his bluff chin.

‘Very well.' He sighed. ‘Conduct this lady to the Chamber of Ancient Armour. She may await me there. My wife is at her bower, you say?' Crumpling the parchment into a ball, he threw it at John, who ducked too late. The messenger bobbed his head in answer and ran out.

As the sun dipped, the clouds in the west parted, allowing a gleam of bronze to lance the lofty windows of the Chamber of Ancient Armour. The room overlooked a walled courtyard of fountains and statues. Across the tapestries on its walls, scenes from history and legend spread themselves, all with a bellicose theme. Here, two cavalry brigades charged at one another, pennants streaming, helmet plumes, manes, and tails flying, to clash in a tangled mass of armoured brawn and rearing, screaming war-horses. There, Dainnan archers in disciplined rows fired a deadly rain of darts, the back line standing with legs astride, braced to shoot, while the front, having spent its arrows, reloaded. On another wall, Warships locked each other in combat among a ferment of storm clouds above a city. Farther on, the infantry of the Royal Legion raged about a trampled field. Their enemies lay thick on the ground and the colours of Eldaraigne fluttered high above.

Antique armours stood against the walls. Dark wooden shelves housed outmoded hauberks-of-mail, habergeons, camails, coudieres, padded and quilted armour of fabric and boiled leather, mail coifs, brigandines, conical helms extruding long nasals, prick spurs, knee-cops and aillettes of leather, rerebraces, vambraces, gauntlets, baldrics, helms winged and fanged and halberds from times long past, dull and sheenless, mostly dented, torn or cloven. The high gabled lids of arming chests hinted at more.

Afternoon light spilled like brandy across an acorn-patterned carpet at the daintily shod feet of the visitor who sat waiting in a chair heaped with brocade cushions. A page boy in the livery of Roxburgh, gold and gray, stood stiffly at her shoulder.

Filigree brass lamps hung on chains from the ceiling and jutted in curled brackets from the walls. A servant scurried about, kindling them to amber glows. Disappointed, the last of the sunrays withdrew. As they did so, a white-wigged footman entered, wearing black pumps and an iron-gray tail-coat with gold trimmings. He bowed.

‘Your Ladyship, His Grace will see you now.'

He held the door open. The dark-haired, masked widow passed through and was guided deferentially to a larger chamber; the Duke of Roxburgh's audience-room. In a loud voice the footman announced, ‘Lady Rohain Tarrenys of the Sorrow Islands.'

The visitor was ushered in.

A hearthful of flames flung warmth into this room, cheerily bouncing their glow off polished walnut furniture and silver-gilt. A pair of cast bronze andirons with eagle motifs supported a burning giant of the forest. They matched the decorated fender, the pokers, the tongs. Crossed swords, broad-bladed hunting knives with deer's foot handles and other trophies of arms enlivened the walls alongside a mounted boar's head with formidable tusks and the masks of other game.

The fire's light was supplemented by three hanging lusters and, atop a table, a bronze urisk holding a massive bouquet of bell-flowers whose cupped petals were candle-sockets. Two more goat-legged wights in marble supported the mantelpiece, which in turn bore a set of equestrian statuettes in malachite and agate. On a bearskin rug before the hearth lay a pair of lean hounds.

Conmor, Duke of Roxburgh, stood by the window. He was still in the field-dress he had worn that day: loose-sleeved shirt, leather doublet slit to the hips, belted loosely at the waist, embossed baldric slung across the shoulder, suede leggings, and knee-boots. Firelight burnished his shoulder-length, unbound locks to dark mahogany.

At her first sight of the Dainnan Commander, a muffled gasp escaped from beneath the visitor's veil.

Thorn
!

But no. Of course not—it was just that she had not been expecting to see a tall figure wearing the subdued Dainnan uniform here in the palace suites, where braided liveries stalked alongside jeweled splendors. This man with brown hair tumbling to his shoulders was not Thorn, although he came close to him in height, and if she had not first seen Thorn, she would have thought the Commander exceedingly comely. He was older, thicker in girth, more solidly built, his arms scarred, his thighs knotted with sinew. At the temples his hair was threaded with silver. Proud of demeanor he was, and stern of brow, but dashing in the extreme.

The warrior leader's hazel eyes, which had widened slightly at the sight of the visitor, now narrowed. Somewhere in remote regions of the palace, something loose banged peevishly in the rising wind.

‘Go and see to that shutter, will you, lad?'

The momentary distraction allowed Rohain-Imrhien to recover her poise. She curtsied and awaited tacit permission to speak.

‘Rohain of the Sorrows,' repeated Roxburgh, ‘pray be seated and remove your widow's veil. Here in the palace we are joyed to look upon the countenance of those with whom we hold converse.'

His guest inclined her head.

‘As Your Grace's servants have many times assured me, sir. But I am uncomfortable without it. I have made a vow—'

‘I insist,' he broke in; a man used to having his demands met and impatient with those who would not cooperate. There seemed to be no choice.

She unhooked the mask and drew it aside.

Her eyes never left his face. She read all that passed across it—the look of surprise, the turning away, then the avoidance of her eyes. What could it mean? This was the first test in the outside world of this new face she wore. Was it then so strange?

‘Wear the veil if you must,' the Dainnan Commander said briskly, throwing his shoulders back as though regaining control of himself after a lapse. ‘Wilfred, have refreshments brought for Her Ladyship and myself.'

Murmuring compliance, Wilfred withdrew.

‘For you must be weary, m'lady,' continued Roxburgh, ‘after your journey. The message I received from the Doorkeeper indicated that you have travelled to Caermelor on an errand of importance, with news that you will entrust only to the King-Emperor.'

Rohain-Imrhien fastened the mask back in place.

‘That is so, Your Grace.'

She perched on the edge of a velvet-covered chair. Roxburgh remained standing, occasionally striding up and down in front of the hearth.

‘Have you any idea,' he said, ‘how many folk come knocking upon the King-Emperor's doors with the same message as you? Petitioners, beggars, would-be courtiers, social climbers—most of them do not get as far as an audience with me. You have been fortunate, so far, due to your apparent station. I have many calls upon my time. His Imperial Majesty the King-Emperor will not hold audience with you. It is a busy time for all—meaning no discourtesy, my lady, but His Majesty has no spare time these days. Our sovereign's waking hours are devoted to the urgent business at hand. As one of His Majesty's ministers I am empowered to speak for him and take messages on his behalf. Now, what are your tidings of import?'

A page in gray-and-gold livery came in bearing a laden tray. He set it down on a table with legs carved like sword irises and inlaid with mother-of-pearl, then bowed to his lord and to the lady.

‘Thank you—'

Rohain's host glanced sharply at her. Obviously she had made a mistake by thanking the lad. It appeared that those born to be served by others did not consider it necessary to show gratitude to the servants here in the palace. She must avoid such errors. To survive here among the denizens of the Royal Court, one must do what all newcomers must do in a strange country—copy the behaviour of the inhabitants. If she observed them closely, if she followed their customs and manners, then she might pass undiscovered.

‘My tidings are for the ears of the King-Emperor,' she repeated.

The Dainnan Chieftain frowned. He seated himself opposite her, leaning back in his chair. ‘Well, My Lady of the Sorrows, it seems we can discover no common ground. Pray, partake of wine and cakes before you depart. I am sorry there can be no commerce between us.'

Ethlinn and Maeve had said that Roxburgh could be trusted, but it would be better to see the King-Emperor himself. She must try for it.

‘I
must
speak with the King-Emperor.'

‘And I have told you that it is impossible.'

He handed her a goblet, silver-gilt, enameled in mulberry.

‘To your health.'

‘And to Your Grace's.'

She raised the vessel, lifted the veil, and drank. The liquor was the essence of peaches, on fire.

‘'Tis a pity to travel so far only to leave with your mission unrequited,' remarked the Duke conversationally, lifting one mightily thewed shank akimbo and resting a boot on his knee.

‘Yes, a pity.'

‘How do they speak of us, in the far Isles of Sorrow?'

‘Highly, sir. But no words I have heard spoken do justice to the wonder and wealth of the Royal City. The name of Conmor, Duke of Roxburgh, is also famous in far-flung places, of course.'

‘And no doubt many a story is attached to it.'

‘All are gestes of valor.'

‘And honour?'

‘Most assuredly!'

‘If Conmor of Roxburgh is spoken of, perhaps you are aware that he has little time for secret messages, being more concerned with the safety of the Empire. It is no secret that war is gathering on the borders. Our spies reported large movements of armed barbarians in northern Namarre last month near the Nenian Landbridge. Yesterday the Royal Legions began deploying five hundred troops to the north as part of the King-Emperor's moves to guard against possible military action by Namarre. I am needed there. I sally forth on the morrow.'

‘I know nothing of such matters, sir, but perhaps a show of strength may be all that is required to make these rebels think again.'

‘Precisely. Otherwise, they shall know the fury of the King-Emperor's Legions.'

‘It is said that they are allied with immortals—unseelie wights of eldritch who are moving northward in answer to some kind of Call; formidable foes.'

‘In sooth, but so-called immortals only live forever unless they choose to die or are slain.'

‘I have heard that if they are wounded so sorely that their bodies become incapable of sustaining existence, they are able to transmute and thus live on in another shape, is it not so?'

‘Some possess that power, yea, but they must take a weaker form, threatless.'

Conversation petered out.

The Dainnan Commander quaffed the remaining contents of his goblet. Rohain-Imrhien sipped her own, replaced it on the inlaid table, and stood up. Roxburgh also rose to his feet.