Arrows of the Queen (25 page)

“Then why wouldn't the boy tell us himself?” Orthallen asked coldly.

“Because I didn't want Talia in trouble, too!” Skif said in a surly tone of voice. “I
told
you I wasn't after The Book, so what business was it of yours what I did want?
You
aren't the Provost-Marshal!”

“Skif,” Kyril said mildly, “He may not be the Provost-Marshal, but Lord Orthallen is entitled to a certain amount of respect from you.”

“Yes, sir,” Skif mumbled and looked steadfastly at his feet.

“Well, now that this matter seems to have cleared itself up, shall we let the miscreants go?” Selenay smiled slightly. “Talia, the next time you want something in the records, just ask Kyril or myself. And we'll make sure you aren't listed in the Census as Holderkin anymore, if that's what you want. But—well, I still don't quite understand why you didn't come to me in the first place.”

Talia knew from the tightness of the skin of her face that she had gone from red to white. “I—it was selfish. UnHeraldlike. I didn't want anybody else to know. . . .”

Elcarth had crossed the space between them and placed an arm around her shoulders. “You're only human, little one—and your kin don't deserve any kindness from you after the way they've disowned you. Skif—” he held out his hand to the boy, who stood slowly, and came to stand beside Talia, taking one of her hands and staring at Orthallen defiantly. “—you and Tarlia go back to your rooms, why don't you? You've had a long night. Don't do this again, younglings, but—well, we understand. Now get along.”

Skif all but dragged Talia from the room.

“Good gods—how the
hell
did you think of that? You were great!
I
started to believe you! And how did you know I was up to my ears in trouble?”

“I don't know—it just sort of came,” Talia replied, “And I just knew you were in for it. What happened? How did you get caught?”

“Sheer bad luck,” Skif said ruefully, slowing their headlong rush down the hall. “Selenay needed some of the Census reports and Orthallen came after them. He saw my light in the Provost-Marshal's office, and caught me red-handed. Gods, gods, was I stupid! It wouldn't have happened if I'd been paying any attention at all to the sounds from the corridor.”

“What was he going to do to you?”

“He was trying to get me suspended. He couldn't get me expelled unless Cymry repudiated me, but—well, he was trying to get me sent off to clean stables for the Army for the next four years—‘until I learned what honest work means,' he said.”

“Could—could he have done that?”

“Unfortunately, he could. I've got one too many marks in The Book. There's an obscure Collegium rule covering that, and he found out about it, somehow. If I didn't know better, I'd say he's been
looking
for a way to get me.”

“You'd better stop helping me, then. . . .”

By now they were outside Talia's door.

“Be damned if I will! This is so frustrating—I'd just found Hulda's records, too! Well, we'll just have to give up on those, and stick with what we've been doing. But there's no way I'm going to let this stop me!”

He stopped, and gave her a quick hug, then pushed her toward her door. “Go on, get some sleep. You look like you could use it, and I feel like somebody's been using me for pells!”

 

Talia was studying alone in her room one night, when there was a light tapping on her door. She opened it—to find a black, demonic looking creature on the other side.

A hand clamped over her mouth before she could shriek, and the thing dragged her back inside, kicking the door closed behind it.

“Ssh! Don't yell—it's me, Skif!” the thing admonished her in a hoarse whisper.

He took his hand away from her mouth gingerly, ready to clamp it down again if she screamed.

She didn't; just stared at him with huge, round eyes. “Skif—what are you trying to
do
to me?” she said finally.“I nearly died of fright! Why are you rigged out like that?”

“Why do you think? You don't go climbing around in the restricted parts of the Palace dressed in Grays—and I'm a bit too young to look convincing in Whites. Get your breath back and calm yourself down because tonight you're coming with me.”

“Me? But—”

“Don't argue, just get into these.” He handed her a tight-fitting shirt and breeches of dusty black. “Good thing you're my size, or nearly. And don't ask me where I got them, or why, 'cause I can't tell you.” He waited patiently while she laced herself into the garments, then handed her a box of greasy black soot. “Rub this anywhere there's skin showing, and don't miss anything—not even the back of your neck.”

He went to her window, opened it to its widest extent, and looked down. “Good. We won't even have to go down to the ground from here.”

He produced a rope and tied it around Talia's waist. “Now follow me—and do exactly what I do.”

The scramble that followed was something Talia preferred not to remember in later years. Skif had them climbing from window to window across the entire length of the Collegium wing, and from there along the face of the Palace itself. Talia was profoundly grateful for the narrow ledge that ran most of the way, for she doubted she could have managed without it. At length he brought them to a halt just outside a darkened window. Talia clung with all her might to the wall, trying not to think of the drop behind her, as he peered cautiously in through the cracks in the shutter.

He seemed satisfied with what he found, for he took something out of a pouch at his belt and began working away at the chink between the two halves of the shutter. Before too long, they swung open. Skif climbed inside, and Talia followed him.

The room disclosed was bare of furniture and seemingly unused. Skif led her to the closet set into one wall, opened it, and felt along the back wall. Talia heard the scrape of wood on wood, and a pair of peepholes was revealed.

Light shone through them from the other side. Talia quickly put her eye to one, and as she did so, Skif handed her a common drinking glass. He pantomimed placing it to the wall and putting her ear against it. She did, and realized she could hear every word spoken in the other room, faintly, but clearly.

“—so at this rate, the child is unlikely ever to be Chosen, much less made Heir. You're dong quite well, quite well indeed,” an unctuous baritone said with satisfaction. “Needless to say, we're quite well pleased with you.”

“My lord is most gracious,” Talia could see the second speaker, Hulda, but was unable to see the first, and his voice was too distorted by the glass for her to recognize it. “Shall I continue as I have gone?”

“Has the child-Herald made any further attempts at Elspeth?”

“No, my lord. She seems to have become discouraged.”

“Still,” the first speaker paused in thought, “we cannot take the chance. I suggest you continue your practice of telling ‘bedtime tales'—you know the ones I mean.”

“If my lord refers to those featuring Companions who carry off unwary children to a terrible fate, my lord can rest assured that I will do so.”

“Excellent. Here is another supply of the drug for the nurse and your usual stipened.”

Talia heard the chink of coins in one of the two pouches Hulda accepted.

“You will come out of this a wealthy woman, Hulda,” the first speaker said as footsteps marked his retreat.

“Oh, I intend it so, my lord,” Hulda said with venom to the closed door. Then she, too, turned and left the room by a second door.

Talia was too busy thinking about what she'd witnessed to worry about the return trip.

When they reached her room, Talia seized a towel and began ruthlessly scrubbing the soot away. “Is that the first time you've watched that?” she asked as she scrubbed.

“The third. The first time was by accident; I'd been following the witch and had to duck into that other room to hide from her; I found the cracks behind a patch in the closet. The second time I took a guess that the first was a regular meeting. I was right. You know something else—no, that's too far-fetched.”

“What is?”

“Well, a couple of times Melidy started to refuse that drug the witch has been feeding her, and—well, she
did
something, I dunno what, but it made her drink it anyway. If I didn't know better, I'd have sworn she was using
real
magic, you know, old magic, like in the legends, to hold power over Melidy's mind.”

“She's probably got some touch of a Gift.”

“Yeah—yeah, I guess you're right.”

“Here, get into these. They're too big for me, so they might fit you.” Talia handed Skif a set of clothing.

“Why?” he asked, astonished.

“Because as soon as you're dressed, we're going to Jadus.”

Jadus was asleep when they reached his room. Under ordinary circumstances Talia would never have dared disturb him, but she felt the occasion warranted her waking him. Skif opened his door silently, and both of them slipped inside.

He roused before Talia and Skif could reach his side, staring at them with a dagger suddenly in his hand.

The elderly Herald had been sleeping uneasily for several nights running and had taken to sleeping as he had in his younger days; with a knife beneath his pillow. He woke with wary immediacy and sat up with the knife in one hand before they were halfway across his bedroom. He blinked in surprise to see the two soot-streaked trainees frozen in midstep.

“Talia!” He was shocked at
her
presence—Skif, with his penchant for pranks, he might have expected. “Why—”

“Please, sir, I'm sorry, but it's an emergency.”

Jadus shook the last sleep from his head, sat up, and gathered a blanket around his shoulders. “Very well, then—I know you better than to think you'd be exaggerating. Blow up the fire, light some candles, and tell me about it.”

He heard them out, Talia prompting Skif to tell his part. Before they'd told him more than a quarter of their tale, he knew that it definitely warranted the classification of “emergency.” By the time they'd finished it, he was chilled.

“If I didn't know you both, I'd have sworn you were making up tales,” he said finally. “And I almost wish you were.”

“Sir?” Talia asked after a lengthy silence, her face drawn with exhaustion. “What should I do?”

“You, youngling? Nothing,” he reached out to both of them, gathering one in each arm and hugging them, grateful for their intelligence and courage. “Talia, Skif, both of you have done far more than any of your elders have managed; I'm pleased and proud of both of you. But now you'll have to trust me to take care of the rest. There are those who need to be told who will listen to an adult, but not to the same words from the mouth of a child. I hope you'll let me speak for you?”

Skif sighed explosively. “
Let
you? Holy stars, I was afraid you were going to make me tell all this to Kyril or Selenay myself! And after getting caught going after those records, I'm afraid my credit isn't any too high with them right now. Oh, no, Herald, I'd much rather that
I
was not the bearer of the bad news. If you don't mind, I'd rather go find my bath and my bed.”

“And you, Talia?”

“Please—if you would,” she looked up at him with eyes full of exhaustion and entreaty. “I wouldn't know what to say. There's too many questions we can't answer. We don't know who ‘my lord' is, for one thing, and if Lord Orthallen starts shouting at me, I—I—think I might cry.”

“Then go, both of you. You can leave everything to me.”

The two rose and padded out, and he sat in deep thought for a moment before ringing for his servant.

“Medren, I need you to have Selenay wakened; ask her to come to my room and tell her that it's quite urgent that she do so. Then do the same for the Seneschal, Herald Kyril, and Herald Elcarth. Build the fire up, and bring wine and food,” he stared thoughtfully into the distance for a moment. “I have the feeling that it is going to be a very long night.”

 

Talia heard no more about Hulda the next day—nor, in fact, did she really care to. She was content to leave the matter in the hands of the adults. The sweet smell of spring blossoms tempted her out into the garden that evening at dusk; since the banishment of the troublemakers there was no danger in roaming the grounds at any hour anymore. She was breathing in the heady scent of hicanth flowers, when she heard strangled sobs emanating from one of the garden grottoes that were so popular with couples after dark.

At first Talia thought that it must be a jilted lover or some other poor unfortunate of the same ilk that was weeping, but the sobs sounded child-like as they increased in strength. She began to feel the same compulsion to investigate them that had prompted her to the Queen's side the winter before.

She remembered what she'd been told about trusting her instincts, and acted on the impulse. She approached the grotto as noiselessly as she could, and peered inside. Lying face-down on the moss, weeping as if her heart were broken, was the Heir.

She entered and sat down beside the child. “You don't look much like a fish anymore,” she said lightly, but putting as much sympathy as she could muster into her words. “You look more like a waterfall. What's wrong?”

“Th-th-they s-s-sent Hulda aw-w-way,” the child wept.

“Who are ‘they,' and why did they send her away?” Talia asked, not yet knowing the results of Jadus' conference.