The Quartered Sea (9 page)

Laughing at her sudden descent into politics, Otavas blew her a kiss and began to fasten various buttons and ties of his own. He'd always known she'd be a wonderful queen, and now that they'd gotten through those four horrible quarters of grief and guilt, he was relieved to see he'd been right all along.

He only hoped she could come to an understanding with the Bardic Hall. Eight years in his adopted country had taught him that, eventually, everything in Shkoder came back to the bards.

* * *

Benedikt was at the Bardic Hall in Vidor before he heard the details about his captain's disagreement with the queen.

"Well, I wouldn't go so far as to say it was a disagreement," murmured Edite, the new lieutenant, leading the way into her office and motioning for Benedikt to sit. "Of course Kovar disapproves of this voyage, but he'd never go so far as to disagree publicly with the queen."

Arms folded over his quintara case—held shieldlike on his lap—Benedikt frowned. "What do you mean, of course?'"

"We're a small country," she told him sharply, "surrounded by larger countries. Our attention must remain focused on the situation here at home, not on chasing some wild melody out over the sea."

"What situation here at home?" This was just one of the many reasons why he hated not being able to Sing air. Every bard in the country knew what he didn't. There certainly hadn't been a situation back when he'd left Pjazef. Unless Pjazef knew something he wasn't telling. There
had
been a guarded tone to the older bard's voice.

"Yes, well. I said, the situation in Shkoder is the same as it has always been." She leaned back, hands clasped under the prominent shelf of her breasts. "If we allow our strength to be bled away…"

"I hardly think one ship will bleed much of anything away," Benedikt protested.

"One ship is where it starts. Where does it end?" Her dark eyes narrowed. "One bard lost is one bard too many; we're all part of the pattern that keeps the country strong."

Pjazef had used that exact line and, his memory prodded by repetition, Benedikt now knew where it came from. As Bardic Captain, Kovar had taught every fledgling since Liene had passed over the title a dozen years ago. Although Benedikt now remembered the lesson, it seemed to have had less effect on him than on the others. He could think of only one reason, only one way he was different. "Do all the bards think like you do?"

"Well, I certainly can't say that I know what
all
the bards think, but those who've Walked out of Vidor since First Quarter Festival have no intention of supporting the queen's fancy."

"Isn't that treason?" Behind what he hoped was an expressionless mask, Benedikt worked at pulling all the bits and pieces into a recognizable tune. Edite had been appointed to her position by Kovar. Although his choice for the lieutenant's position in Vidor had been limited to those bards who Sang all four quarters, would he have chosen Edite if she hadn't supported his views?

"I hardly think it's treason to have a different opinion than the queen." I "What about acting opposite to the queen's desires?"

"We do not act opposite to the queen's desires. We merely keep our mouths shut."

Edite's tone suggested that the discussion was over and she backed it up by rising and nodding toward the door.

Too angry for caution, Benedikt paused, half over the threshold and without turning, threw one last protest back over his shoulder. "When bards keep their mouths shut, it
is
an action."

Later that evening, in the largest ale house in Vidor, Benedikt took his quintara out of her case, wiped damp palms against his thighs, tried not to think of how many eyes, how many ears, were on him, and sang "The Dark Sailor."

The queen had remembered him, had acknowledged his work, had put her trust, her life in his Song.

He would not join this conspiracy of silence against her.

By the time he sought his bed, he'd sung the haunting ballad in three more ale houses and to a group of Riverfolk down by the docks. Although he couldn't see the air kigh swooping around his head, the night had become distinctly breezy by the final chorus.

The next morning, fingers white around the handle of his instrument case, he managed to look Edite in the eye and calmly say, "Am I not as entitled to have a different opinion to the Bardic Captain as he is to have a different opinion to the queen?"

"You don't Sing air," Edite told him sharply. "You don't know what other bards are thinking."

It was the first time any of them had ever come right out and said it. He only Sang water. He wasn't as good as the rest of them. Well, bugger them, too.

"I don't Sing air," he snarled, "so I think for myself."

He carried the look on Edite's face with him from the room—eyes wide, mouth opening and closing, she looked like a fish out of water. And if he'd alienated the people he had to spend the rest of his life with, well, he didn't Sing air, did he, so how would he know?

The anger prodded him to sing "The Dark Sailor" in every inn along the River Road.

* * *

Tadeus ran into an old friend on his way to the River Maiden so, what with one thing and another—mostly another—it was late evening by the time he arrived at the inn. Stomach growling, guided as much by his nose as by the kigh, he hurried across the landward yard toward the closest entrance.

"Fried fish and potatoes. Fresh fiddleheads in butter. And, if I'm lucky," he told the breeze by his cheek, "stewed pears in custard."

One foot on the porch step, he stopped and cocked his head, a pair of breezes dancing through the silvered curls above his ears. There was a bard already inside and he was about to sing. When the kigh told him which bard, he whistled softly.

That changed things. The River Maiden had long been one of Tadeus' favorite inns, and he'd long been a favorite of the inn's regulars—his sudden appearance would pull attention away from the younger bard. That kind of grandstanding would be rude at the best of times. Tadeus wasn't sure what it might be called in these particular times.

"
In spite of everything I tried during his training, Benedikt has hung on tightly to his feelings of inadequacy
." Magda's shrug had admitted a weary defeat. "
But Benedikt is the queen's choice and I don't even want to consider what will happen should Kovar convince him not to go on this voyage
."

Padding noiselessly across the porch, he cracked open one of the double doors and slipped into the broad hall that ran the width of the building. Designed to keep Fourth Quarter winds from blowing in on the paying customers, it held a number of pegs for wet weather gear and a Bard's Closet tucked under a locked flight of stairs.

The noise from the common room masked any sound he may have made as he crossed the hall and quietly Sang the notes to open the closet door. Sifting the din into its component conversations, he smiled as he shrugged out of his jacket and lifted his harp free of her case. Word had spread that there was a bard at the River Maiden and the room was full. Good. The night's performances would deserve a full house.

As a quick run of notes from the strings of a quintara commanded something approximating silence, he moved to a shadow just outside the archway leading into the common room—a position that should keep him hidden if the bard by the fire happened to glance his way.

"The Dark Sailor" was a ballad, tied to the rhythms of the sea. Tadeus had never heard it sung as a defiant anthem be fore, and he wasn't entirely certain it was suited to the role Not that it mattered. When a bard sang the way young Benedikt was singing, lyric and melody both were only the framework of the greater Song.

Defiance.

I am as good as any of you.

You can't tell me what to sing.

I stand by the queen.

So there.

Sifting the room for reaction, Tadeus grinned. Benedikt was young and handsome with a fine, strong, and, more importantly, bardic baritone. He could've sung the menu and still gotten an appreciative response from most of this audience—a trick Tadeus himself had tried successfully a time or two in the past. But if Benedikt wanted to do more than merely air personal grievances—if, say, he wanted to influence public opinion, to drum up support for the queen's voyage—he was going to need a little help.

In the moment between the applause and the next song Tadeus stepped out into the light.

"Tadeus!"

The weight of the crowd's attention moving from him was almost a physical sensation, and its sudden absence brought on relief so overwhelming Benedikt felt nauseous. Swallow ing convulsively, he stopped fiddling with strings that wen already perfectly tuned and looked, with everyone else toward the back of the room.

In spite of everything, he couldn't prevent a smile. The old bard certainly knew how to make an entrance. Dressed in spotless black, silver hair above the scarf over his eyes silver buttons down the front of a velvet vest, one huge silver ring on the first finger of his right hand, he was the epitome of elegance and wouldn't have looked out of place at Court Glancing down at his own travel-stained clothing, Benedikt scraped at a bit of mud with his thumbnail and wondered how Tadeus managed to keep so clean on a First Quarter walk when he couldn't even see the puddles to avoid them.

As the welcome rose to a crescendo, Tadeus bowed and moved slowly toward the fire. Crossing a crowded room was something he enjoyed doing, and he saw no need to hurry—after all, a blind man saw through his fingertips.

Laughing, he turned down several offers of company, one or two gratifyingly explicit, and stopped an arm's reach from Benedikt, bestowing upon the younger man the full force of his smile.

"May I join you?"

Confused, Benedikt nodded, realized what he was doing and said, "You can't stop me from singing 'The Dark Sailor.' "

"Of course I can't." Reaching behind him, Tadeus pulled a chair to the fireside and sat, arranging his harp on his lap. "You just sang it."

With a worried glance at the nearest tables, Benedikt pitched his voice for Tadeus' ears alone. "Then why are you here?"

"I always stop at the River Maiden on my way to Vidor." Frowning at the tone of a string, he reached into his vest pocket for his harp key. "You're causing quite a stir, you know. Most of the other bards think you've got a chip on your shoulder the size of the Citadel. That you're deliberately causing trouble. Unfortunately, this is an opinion shared by bards who would otherwise support your position."

The younger man stiffened. "I don't care what most of the other bards think."

"I know. You haven't exactly gone out of your way to make friends. Now, personally, I think that a bard, any bard, should be able to sing anything that doesn't contravene our oaths and that each of us have as much right to an opinion as our illustrious Bardic Captain."

"That," Benedikt muttered, "is not what our illustrious Bardic Captain thinks."

"If we're entitled to our opinion, Kovar's equally entitled to his. No matter how irritating, shortsighted, unimaginative, commonplace, provoking, and tiresome it might be."

Which was more or less what he'd said to Edite back in Vidor. Minus a bit of description. Benedikt's heart began to pound so loudly he could barely hear himself speak. He hadn't realized how good it would feel to have an ally. "
We're
entitled?"

Satisfied with his tuning, Tadeus tucked the key away and lightly ran his thumbnail over the strings. "I assume you know 'Search Beyond Tomorrow'?"

"Well, sure, but it's…"

"One of those feel-good songs everyone in this room probably knows." He turned his head, and Benedikt had the strangest feeling that the blind eyes were looking right at him. "It's a song about being open to new possibilities. When you're trying to change someone's mind," he added with a sudden grin, "it's always best to begin on common ground."

"Liene encouraged our individual strengths and expected us to do what we thought was right. While she quite often felt she knew best, she never tried to impose her opinions on the whole. She conducted a complex melodic line during her years as Bardic Captain."