The Quartered Sea (4 page)

She couldn't remember moving into the comforting circle of Otavas' arms nor could she remember crying, but his arms were around her and her cheeks were wet. Her body felt awkward as she stepped slowly forward and pressed both palms against the stone. This place, this monument, the lament—all three had nothing to do with her. Together they lifted the dark weight of her mother's death, the weight she'd carried since the day the Bardic Captain had told her she was queen and could finally do all the things she'd planned.

She waited until the stone turned warm under her hands, then she turned and started walking back toward the horses. "We should go."

His own eyes damp, Otavas fell into step beside her. She leaned gratefully against his support.

"Are you all right,
carimei
?" He murmured the Imperial endearment against her hair.

"I don't know." Every movement she made seemed to take more conscious thought than it ever had. "I feel empty."

A half-dozen careful steps behind, Kovar turned to the healer and pitched his voice for her ears alone. "Empty? Is that good?"

Most of her attention still on the queen, Magda shrugged. "That depends on what moves in to fill the space."

* * *

"Majesty?" All fledglings Sang in the Citadel's Center as part of their training so she'd definitely heard him, he just couldn't believe she'd remember.

"You Sang water. My mother once told me that she thought you could Sing the kigh out of a tear. I can't think of anyone I'd rather have Sing me across the strait.
And
," she continued as he searched for a response, any response, "I read your recall on the floods in Seven's Bay back in Third Quarter. Good work."

He stammered his thanks, managing not to disgrace his training too badly although he barely heard the Bardic Captain's request for a meeting so they could discuss the next day's ceremony. When the consort's Imperial bodyguard snapped his fingers under his nose, Benedikt was astonished to see that the royal party had moved into the inner bailey. "I'm sorry." Feeling as though he'd could walk on water if the queen required it, he smiled apologetically at the waiting ex-assassin. "Do you want me?"

While golden-haired young men with that pouty just-smacked-in-the-mouth vulnerability weren't exactly his type, Bannon flashed him a predator smile on principle. "Maybe later. Right now, I need you to show me tomorrow's pattern."

A thick Imperial accent added strange emphasis to the words. "Pattern?"

"Where Her Majesty will be, where His Highness will be, where everyone else will be." When Prince Otavas had contracted to join with the Heir of Shkoder, Bannon had added the Princess Jelena to his responsibilities. No one had asked him to, but since his prince had thought it an excellent idea, no one had been able to stop him either.

Benedikt frowned. Kovar had told him he'd be attending the ceremony at the forts before his last Walk, almost as he was on his way out the Citadel gates. He'd had no time to read the recall of his immediate predecessor, but some things were a given. "You accompanied His Highness here in Second Quarter."

"I did."

"It'll be the same ceremony."

"Not quite. Her Majesty wasn't here in Second Quarter." Gripping the bard's shoulder a little harder than was strictly necessary, he turned him in a slow circle. "Those barrels weren't here in Second Quarter; two of the flagstones by the gate are cracked, there's a new half door on the stable, and there's evidence of repair on the rim of the well."

Benedikt whistled softly in amazement and remembered some of the stories floating around the Citadel concerning the ex-assassin. Apparently, those involving his obsessive attention to detail were true. Remembering other stories, a chill spread out from under the pressure of the gripping fingers and lapped against the bard's spine. If some were true, then all could be, and many weren't particularly pleasant. Although some were. An unexpected heat followed the chill, and Benedikt had to swallow before he could ask, "Is there any danger?"

"Always. But if you're asking if Her Majesty is in any danger…" Bannon grinned ferally. "Not when I'm around."

Benedikt didn't doubt that for a moment.

And as he pointed out the places the queen and her consort would stand, as he waited while Bannon calculated lines of sight, he couldn't stop thinking of how
he
was now one of the details the ex-assassin noted.

* * *

"You're looking solemn," Kovar commented quietly as he and Magda picked their way down a spiral staircase to the floor below the royal suite. "Is there a problem?"

"Not exactly. A couple of the guards are still carrying a lot of guilt about the late queen's death but I feel that escorting Her Majesty here safely should help them work through it and move on."

"Since we're speaking of Her Majesty…" Conscious of the way the stone bounced sound all around them, Kovar dropped his voice until the words were little more than a soft buzz against the healer's ear. "Shouldn't you be with her?"

"That wasn't what I meant." Stepping out into the corridor, she turned and favored him with a disapproving scowl. "And they don't need you repeating the opinion of every other old fusspot in the country."

"Every
other
old fusspot?"

His indignant protest banished the scowl and drew a laugh. "Kovar, you're a year older than my father."

"And that makes me incredibly decrepit, I'm sure." He sighed, wondering, not for the first time, when the children had taken over. "And as I am so decrepit, I'd best have the room closest to the garderobe." When Magda indicated he should go ahead, he pushed open the door and glanced into the small rectangle. "All the comforts of home."

"And exactly like this one," Magda added, looking into the next room along. "A bed, a chair, and a washstand. I can see why the members of the court aren't exactly falling over each other to accompany Her Majesty on this trip. Can you imagine the Due of Vidor's reaction to this?" She peered curiously down the corridor at another half-dozen identical doors. "I wonder if they've ever managed to fill their guest quarters."

"I expect young Benedikt's in one of them."

"Ah."

About to enter his room, Kovar paused. "Was that a professional ah, or a personal ah?" When Magda hesitated, he took a step toward her. "I know you saw him a great deal when he was a fledgling, but I'd thought all that had been dealt with."

Both Magda's brows rose and she folded her arms, suddenly looking much older than her twenty-five years. "All that?"

"The boy's belief that he wasn't worth much because he only Sang water. He's a fine bard, you know, does an excellent recall."

"In spite of his handicap."

Kovar drew himself up to his full height and stared down at the healer, mustache quivering. "I
never
said that."

"You didn't have to, I can feel your pity."

"Pity?" Only years of voice control kept him from shouting. "Benedikt is a bard of Shkoder, and he Sings a stronger water than anyone I have ever known."

"I'm aware of that." She cocked her head to one side and held Kovar in a steady gaze. "But it's very rare for a bard not to be able to Sing air, isn't it? In fact, when a bard sings only one quarter, it's
usually
air. I can't think of another bard alive right now that doesn't sing air, can you?"

"Fine. He's not a boy. And sympathy is not the same as pity. Jazep, your name-father, Sang only earth, the most restricted of all the four quarters, and I never felt pity for him."

"Because he never invited it. Benedikt does. Thanks to the misplaced enthusiasms of his parents, who were rather like ducks raising a songbird, he doesn't see what he has, only what he lacks. Not all the time, of course, or I'd have kept him with me longer—but often enough that he's convinced the rest of you it's a lack as well. He is a bard, after all, and bards can be very convincing."

"Do you think," the Bardic Captain growled, "that I should keep Benedikt from Singing the queen's boat across the strait?"

Magda smiled. "Why, if he Sings a stronger water than anyone you've ever known?"

After a long moment during which he reminded himself that throttling the young healer wasn't an option, Kovar expelled a long breath through his nose and spread his hands. "Thank you for the lesson. In the future I will try to keep in mind those talents Benedikt has, not those he lacks. There is no reason to feel sorry for a bard of Shkoder."

"Hey." Magda spread her own hands in turn. "You don't have to convince me."

The next morning Her Majesty, Queen Jelena, inspected the troops gathered in the inner bailey, then walked the walls to ensure they remained in good repair. While Benedikt Witnessed and Kovar Sang the air kigh to ensure that everyone in the fort could hear, she stood on an artificial cliff facing the sea and swore that Shkoder would not fall as long as Fort Kazpar stood.

Just after noon, the Troop-Captain handed his queen down onto the small boat that would take her across the Bache ky Lamer—the Mouth of the Sea in the old Riverfolk tongue—to Fort Tunov. Another captain, another troop would meet her on the other side. "Thank you, Majesty," he said as he released her hand.

Jelena nodded, a gracious smile carefully hiding emotional turmoil. As much irritated that Madga had been right as she was pleased that wounds—hers and her guards—seemed to be healing, she allowed Otavas to lead her away from the side so that the crew could cast off lines. Unfortunately, the morning's ceremony had done little to fill the emptiness left behind after the dissipation of despair. The ritual had required only a surface involvement and, looking back on it, she could barely remember what she'd said or done. She'd discovered during her long year of grieving that when performing many of the queen's duties, show sufficed where substance was lacking.

* * *

"We're away from the dock." Bannon nodded toward the deckhands stowing the lines. "Aren't you supposed to be Singing?"

"Me?" Suddenly realizing how stupid that must sound, Benedikt hurriedly answered the actual question. "No. Not yet." The ex-assassin had been close by his side all day; charming because he wanted to be, threatening because he couldn't not. Benedikt wasn't sure how he felt about the unexpected companionship. Or how he was supposed to feel. "I don't know why you're even here," he protested.

Bannon shrugged, a minimal rise and fall of one shoulder, deliberately infuriating. "I go where my prince goes."

"Any danger out in the strait will come from the sea." The waves grew choppier as they moved from the shore. "How can you protect him from that?"

"I can't. I guess I'll just have to depend on you."

Sarcasm blended so smoothly with threat, a bard couldn't have done it better. Benedikt stiffened. He didn't have to put up with that kind of attitude from anyone. Not even from an Imperial assassin. His muscles had actually tensed to turn and walk away when Bannon caught and held his gaze, and he suddenly realized that turning his back on this man was quite possibly the stupidest thing he could do.

Suddenly aware that they were standing alone, a considerable distance from anyone else on the ship, Benedikt's mouth went dry. "I won't let anything happen to him. To them. To their Majesties."

"Good."

Benedikt could clearly hear the consequences of failure in that single word. Walk away? What good would that do? Anywhere he went, Bannon could follow him.

Where do assassins sleep ?

Anywhere they want to.

Imperial humor leaned toward the obvious.