Veiled Rose (24 page)

“O Gleamdren fair, I love thee true.

Be the moon waxed full or new,

In all my world-enscoping view,

There shineth none so bright as you.”

Daylily nodded quietly to herself as the prince performed the first few bars of the familiar song. A song of Eanrin, Chief Poet of Iubdan Rudiobus, it was one of the most renowned romantic ballads in all history. And Lionheart had chosen to play it for her. She did not smile, for that might be too obvious, but she gazed long and full at Lionheart’s face.

“Sing of all the lovers true

Beneath a sky of sapphire hue.

In light o’ the love I bear for you,

All theirs must fade like morning dew.”

So why, she wondered, did he keep glancing at his mother that way?

Lionheart sang on:

“This passion that I feel for you

Is something rather like the flu.

The flu brought on by cook’s new stew

That tasted like an old man’s shoe.

"Oh, sing me now a song of stew!

A stew that’s fit for lover’s brew!

A stew so hearty and so—”

“Lionheart!”

Queen Starflower’s voice struck like an arrow to its mark. Even King Hawkeye, who was chuckling quietly behind his hand, coughed and sat up at her words. Daylily, as those last verses poured off the prince’s tongue, had grown pale and clenched her fists tightly in her lap.

The queen’s eyes snapped fire. “If you cannot sing the work of Bard Eanrin with the proper reverence, I beg you will desist.”

Prince Lionheart gave his mother a boyish grin. “Come on, Mother, it was just a bit of fun! Those old songs get so—”

“Have done,” said Starflower, holding up her hand.

Daylily could take no more. She rose from her place and curtsied to those assembled, but did not look Lionheart’s way. “Forgive me,” she said in her sweetest voice, “but I am fatigued from the day’s journey. May I have Your Majesties’ leave to retire?”

The Eldest nodded, and Daylily swept from the room, still without a look the prince’s way. As a servant opened and shut the dining hall door behind her, she heard Lionheart begin, “Now, look here, Mother, you know those songs are lousy at best. I don’t see why—”

Daylily hastened on. Her expression was serene and her chin high as she made her way to her apartments, followed by her goodwoman. When she reached the doorway to her rooms, she dismissed the woman with a wave of her hand. “I will see to myself tonight,” she said. “You may go.”

Her goodwoman knew better than to argue and bowed herself away. Daylily stepped inside and shut the door.

She did not rage. She did not scream. She did not stamp her feet, not even once. She crossed to her fireplace and sat in the chair drawn up before it. Someone had lit a small blaze, and although it was a little too hot for comfort, Lady Daylily did not care.

“How could he treat me with such disrespect?” she whispered to the flames.

She was no fool. Nobody in that room could have failed to miss the message Prince Lionheart declared by twisting that reverenced song into a jester’s ditty. What a fool he was . . . and she too for that matter! What a fool for coming here again when she knew just what he was. A rattlebrained scamp without a mature idea in his head! What a fool she was for thinking ten months would make any difference.

Daylily put a hand lightly to her temple and closed her eyes. What a fool she was for letting her heart—

A clatter from the bedchamber door. Daylily sat up straighter and folded both hands in her lap, not deigning to look around. “I thought I told you that I would look after myself tonight,” she said in a crisp voice.

But it was not her maidservant who answered. “Forgive me, m’lady. I didn’t realize you’d be back so soon.”

Daylily turned. A chambermaid stood in the doorway between the bedroom and the sitting room, a porcelain pitcher in her hand. She curtsied and said, “I was on my way to refill this for your ladyship, but I can come back later.”

The girl was covered in veils.

“Rose Red,” said Daylily. “I remember you.”

The chambermaid curtsied again. “Forgive me for disturbin’ you, m’lady—”

“Come here,” Daylily said. “Leave that pitcher, and come here.”

Rose Red obeyed. If she trembled behind the veil, Daylily could not see it. Though her rags had been exchanged for a clean servant’s smock and her old veils replaced with new ones of fresh linen, she still looked rather horrible, standing before the fire with its lights and shadows playing off her small frame. Daylily licked her lips.

“He cares for you a great deal, doesn’t he?”

Rose Red made no answer. She did not know what to say.

“The prince, I mean,” Daylily continued. “Leo.”

The maid shook her head and curtsied again. “He is a good and kind master, m’lady.”

“And what about me?” Daylily asked. “Do you think I might be a good and kind mistress?”

“I . . . m’lady, I—”

“That is what I will be someday,” the baron’s daughter continued. “Your mistress. Not just a guest in this household, but its lady. Its queen.”

The maid curtsied again.

“Do you doubt me?”

“I trust you must believe what you’re sayin’,” Rose Red replied in a whisper, then added quickly, “m’lady.”

“Will you serve me then as faithfully as you serve your prince now?”

Rose Red made no answer. She could hardly breathe, and the fire behind her was hot.

Daylily spoke again, and this time her voice was as smooth as honey. “What do you hide behind that veil, Rose Red?”

“That’s my secret.”

“Does Leo know your secret?”

There was something terrible in the way Daylily used the prince’s boyhood nickname; something possessive. Rose Red shook her head sharply, her gloved hands clenched into fists. “The secret is mine,” she said, “to tell or keep as I will.”

“It is no birthmark,” Daylily whispered. “Nor are you what the mountain folk claim.”

“It’s my secret,” Rose Red repeated. She wanted to back away, but the baron’s daughter held her locked in her gaze. So she closed her eyes behind her veil, hoping somehow to gain the courage to flee.

Daylily set her teeth. Then she reached out and removed the veil from Rose Red’s face.

The fire crackled on its hearth. Outside, the wind pressed up against the window, rattling the glass, then moved on its way with a howl. The Lady of Middlecrescent and the prince’s chambermaid stared at each other in the dimly lit chamber, and in that moment, neither wore a veil.

“I see,” Daylily said at last.

Rose Red let out a shuddering breath. Then her hands were over her face, and she crouched at the lady’s feet. “I see,” Daylily said again, peering down at the girl. She drew her dainty slippers back. “Now I too know your secret.”

The crumpled maid gave a sob. “Please, m’lady,” she said. “Please, give me back my veil.”

But Daylily held on to it, running the soft fabric between her fingers. “Swear to me,” she said, her voice hoarse, “that you will serve me.”

“Please, m’lady.”

“Swear it. You will now be my servant and serve me as faithfully as you serve your master. For I know your secret as well as he.” She grimaced as though she must bite out the words. “Swear it, now.”

Rose Red sobbed again, but she sat upright. With unveiled face, she looked up into the face of the baron’s daughter. A tear ran down her cheek. “I swear it, m’lady,” she said.

Then she held out her hand. “Please give me back my veil.”

T
HE GOAT PEN
was a dozy place at night. All the Eldest’s goats huddled on one side, their hairy haunches pressed together, long lashes lowered over yellow eyes. Some chewed their cud. Most slept the sleep of the just, for goats, on the whole, are a just lot. The atmosphere was heavy with hay and musk and sleep.

But Beana stood at the far end of the pen, her nose upraised, sniffing.

It bothered her sometimes that she could still catch a whiff of roses now and again, for she knew they were long since gone. They had once blossomed thickly in these parts, however, and perhaps the ghost of their aromas still lingered. Not even the perfumes of a hundred other flowers blossoming in the warm summer climate of Southlands could entirely disguise that memory of beauty.

Beana sought a different scent. Her senses were as tense as her body every night when the moon was new and the sky was black.

For these nights were always the worst.

“I know you’re there,” she muttered. “I know you’re waiting.”

“Waitin’ for what?”

Beana turned and found her girl climbing the fence into the pen. “Rosie!” she exclaimed and trotted up to her. “What are you doing out here so late? You should have been in bed long ago—” She noticed suddenly how the girl was trembling. “Bebo’s crown!” she exclaimed. “You heard it, didn’t you?”

Rose Red sank to the dirty pen floor, wrapping her arms about her knees. “Heard what, Beana?” she asked in a tremulous voice.

“Why, the . . .” Beana shook her horns. “Nothing, girl, nothing. What are you shivering about?”

Then, much to the goat’s surprise, Rose Red put her head down on her knees and burst into tears.

“Sweet Hymlumé! What’s gotten into you?”

Beana put her nose to the girl’s ear, nuzzling and bleating, but the crying ran its full course before Rose Red could gasp out any words. Then she said, “She don’t love him, Beana.”

“Who doesn’t love whom?”

“Lady Daylily. She don’t love my master, not one bit of it.”

“Prince Lionheart?”

“Yes. I mean, no. I mean, yes, she don’t.”

Beana snorted but gently nuzzled the girl again. “Well, child, that’s for them to muddle through, now, isn’t it?”

Rose Red, her face still buried in her knees, shook her head. “I don’t want her to marry him, Beana. She doesn’t even respect him, much less love him.”

“How are you to know her heart, my girl?” Beana said. “That pretty Daylily, she’s an odd one, I’ll grant you. Not someone I’d like to have on my bad side. But that doesn’t mean she can’t love your prince, doesn’t mean she can’t make him a good wife and a good queen.”

Still Rose Red shook her head. “She don’t deserve him, Beana.”

“That’s not for you or me to decide,” said the goat. She knelt down and let the girl wrap her arms around her neck. She felt Rose Red remove her veil so that her tears could flow unchecked into Beana’s rough coat. She felt the girl’s mouth open several times, heard her breath catch as though she was about to speak. But she always closed it again and simply sat there, crying.

Rose Red could not bring herself to say that Daylily had seen her face. Nor could she mention the vow she had sworn at that lady’s feet. So she sat there in the smelly goat pen, crying for shame and frustration.

When at last her tears began to dry, Beana said softly, “We can go back, Rosie.”

“Go back where?”

“To the mountain.” The goat tried to keep the eagerness from her voice but could not disguise all traces of it. “We don’t have to stay here if it is so painful for you. We’d find a way to get by. Sure, you eat well here and people don’t touch you, but all in all, you’re as lonely here as ever you were. And I know you miss the forest.”

But Rose Red began to tremble again, and this time it had nothing to do with tears. She pulled back from Beana, tugging her veil back into place. “No,” she said.

“Now, Rosie, you could at least think about it. Your prince has been kind to you, for sure, but that doesn’t mean—”

“No!”

So that conversation ended. They sat quietly, pressed against each other for comfort, neither speaking. Beana, though her body now relaxed, strained every sense she possessed with listening . . . listening and smelling and waiting for some sign of that Other, whom she knew must be close, but who spoke not a word. If only she could take Rose Red back up into the mountains, away from the low country, away from the Wilderlands! Up to that fresh, high air where the Other could not walk, where its voice could never penetrate. Up where Beana could be certain the girl was safe. If only, if only . . .

Rose Red’s mind whirled with entirely separate thoughts. She could never return to the mountain, to the madness of that dark and terrible Dream! Starvation she could handle; loneliness she could survive. But not that Dream again. For ten months or more, she had been free. True, life was no bed of flowers, but that mattered little. She could serve her prince—her Leo—and do some good. But she could not bear to face that Dream.

Return to me in a year and a day,
the voice in her memory whispered.
Or I will come for you.

A nightmare, that’s all it was. But one she must avoid.

“We ain’t never goin’ back to the mountain,” she whispered fiercely even as she pillowed her head on Beana’s warm back and closed her eyes to sleep. “Never!”