Everran's Bane (9 page)

Inyx was studying the Hazghend parchment. His brows knit. He said slowly, “This is a month old.”

“My uncle the royal incubator!” Beryx erupted all over again. “He's sat on those for a month! The—the—incompetent!” It was the worst insult in his vocabulary. He hove himself up the bed. “Find me a horse-litter, Inyx. I can't rot here any longer, Four knows what else he's done. No, woman, blight your splinters. I'm going home!”

Over his head Inyx caught my eye, and very nearly achieved a wink.

* * * * *

Characteristically, the turmoil of departure did not make Beryx forget his debts. While I was packing my harp, Stavan came in, perched on the table, and presently remarked, “King sent for me.”

I cocked an eye.

“Offered me a stewardship. Said, ‘If you ran this mess, you'll run the palace in your sleep.' I said, I belong in Stiriand. He said, ‘Then Gerrar shall rebuild the house at Coed Wrock.'” He shook his head. “Dictated the order there and then.”

“You deserve it.” I thought how I would miss him, how we had met. “Twice over.”

He shrugged. Fingered my harp. Hesitated. Then, with a palpable jerk, he plunged.

“Harper... what do you know about aedryx?” he said.

“Aedryx?” I was puzzled. “I never heard of it.”

“Them.”

He was watching me oddly. “Who are they?” I asked, wondering what obscure branch of Stiriann folklore I had missed.

He looked down, growing still more reluctant. At last he said, “Wizards.” A pause. “In the old days.” Another pause. “There are songs.”

“I've never heard them.” I was professionally piqued.

He shot me another fleeting glance. Then he brought the words out as if loading a fireball catapult.

“They say... Lossian was one. And... he had green eyes.”

Then he was off the table and gone before I could assemble a question to chase, let alone catch, the hint.

Thassal was yet more tantalizing. She saw Beryx to his horse-litter, and as she stood by it in the steep stony street I now knew so well, he held out his left hand. “Thank you,” he said, “general. Now where?—ah.” He hauled his right arm forward. “Here, pull this off.”

She looked down at the great seal ring in her palm. It was a finghend, green and vivid as his eyes, worth a fortune. When Beryx gave, he did it with both hands.

“I doubt,” she said, “Coed Wrock's enough.”

“Coed Wrock's for Stavan. This is for you. Rot it, woman, how low should I value my life?”

His mock ferocity raised a faint flush on her cheek. Then, with Stavan's air of reaching a hard decision, she looked up.

“King,” she said, “I'll give you a gift to match. If you need to know about aedryx—come to Coed Wrock.”

Beryx started so violently he upset the horses. “Aedryx! How do you know?—what do you?—here, Thassal, listen—come back! Oh... let her go.” He lay watching her gray skirt flick from sight, but all the way to Kelflase he was unnaturally silent. And what I found still odder was that he never, then or later, mentioned the incident to any of us.

After Kelflase a paven road replaced the half-finished horse-track, another sick-bed project, but it was still not fast enough for the king. Counselors might nurse their saddle-galls, the physician might bleat of convalescence, Inyx might cock an anxious eye. Beryx disembarked each night white and sweating worse than the horses, and climbed in next morning saying, “For the Four's sake, let's get on!”

With summer waxing, Saeverran's grass had hayed off, Saphar's vines were blowsy, heavy-laden, and the humid mornings beckoned to days of laziness. Earth-day had left every road thick with saplings which the refugees watered, as they harvested hay and weeded vines and filled every other occupation ingenuity could suggest. More and more often as we moved south Beryx was met by anxious local governors asking if the Treasury could finance a new well or renovated market for refugee work, by deme leaders swamped with Stiriand folk and fowls and stallions and worried it was permanent, by garrison commanders enquiring about strategy and wine-lords nervy about the market. Or simply by wives whose men had been levied and who asked, “When will he be back?” Small wonder he reached Saphar as thin and haggard and hectic as before Inyx arrived.

When we descended to Azilien it was afternoon, and the riverbanks were thick with small white and gold ahltaros flowers turned to the westering sun. The air had lost its springtime clarity. The city and the Helkent themselves looked vaguely smudged. As we clattered on to the bridge I saw Beryx thrust open the litter curtains with a hunger in his gaunt face. Then it changed.

Over the bridge breast appeared a floral archway, banners, a horde of bobbing heads, and the tall figure of the Regent, splendid in official robes.

Inyx's litter shot out a volley of soldier's oaths that closed on, “Unconquering heroes—eccch!” Four, I thought, as those determinedly gay smiles curdled my own stomach: you could have spared him this!

The advance-guard slowed. The cheering began. A citizens' band struck up the march I had burlesqued; the Regent advanced with outheld hand and a fulsome smile on his silly face. I heard Beryx snap at his horse-leader, “Halt!” As the Regent reached the litter, he thrust the curtains wide.

Nothing is so foolish as forced joy gone bad. The Regent's hands followed his jaw down. There was no mistaking the expression, and Beryx would have had it full face.

He made a valiant recovery. “My dear boy—my dear boy—whatever have you been doing—oh, dear oh dear—” To cap it, he tried to help Beryx out, a thing not even Inyx dared.

The king emerged between his arms, face white where it was not purple, jaw rigid with the double effort of standing alone and of concealing it. “No, uncle,” he said with a glittering smile. “The question, surely, is: What have
you
been doing?”

I heard Inyx's demonically gleeful snort. Beryx cut through a cloud of excuse and explanation, extending his left arm for the ritual embrace.

The Regent would plainly have sooner cuddled a toad. The band was still thumping, grotesque in the widening hush, my sickened stomach had become a knot of rage. To be sure, they could not help it, any more than their well-meaning welcome: but let anyone say anything, I vowed, and harper or no harper, I'll put his teeth down his throat.

Beryx, as usual, was already in control. “You shouldn't have come down, uncle.” A purr that barely hid the claws. “I'm not fit yet, I'll have to go straight home. But I shall expect you up there at the first advice.” Right royal rage would precede a more than right royal rebuke. He climbed back in the litter, the Regent flapping behind him: jerked his head to the horse-leader, sat up straight, and yanked both curtains wide.

You may imagine his progress for yourself. All the way up the hill they were out to cheer him, and all the way they tried. He sat through it, back straight, jaw rigid, nodding to the odd acquaintance. I daresay he would sooner have been washed in boiling oil.

When he emerged at the gate-arch, Inyx and I dead-heated to his shoulder. “No, you old idiot,” he said without venom. “You're no better than I am. Harran, give me a hand.”

As we climbed his weight grew heavier, his breathing more painful, his face wetter, till I ached to cry, “For the Lords' sake, let me carry you!” But I dared not suggest a half-minute's rest.

The armory guards saluted him when we passed: not a royal gesture, but a true salute, of soldiers to a defeated fellow, a gallantry they could understand. Seeing his face ease, I could have cheered them both.

We turned the corner. Reached the path to the royal rooms. And down from her outpaced maidens Sellithar came running, ethereal in a smoke-blue gown, glitter of golden hair and coronal, joy in those clear blue eyes.

“At last!” I never heard her sound more beautiful. “Where have you been?” And as she spoke, Beryx lifted his face.

She could not have helped it. It was a thing beyond anyone's help, too quick and instinctive and spontaneous to prevent. Her stride faltered, her eyes flared, her face shouted shock, horror, revulsion. And it was over, in that flash.

She caught her smile and her footing and ran forward, words tumbling as she forced joy and relief and welcome back into that lovely limpid voice. I felt Beryx go stiff, as if to meet a spear-thrust with his naked flesh.

His good arm was over my shoulder. As she reached him, he stood up straight and unmoving, and said in a voice that could have been everyday, “I'm glad to see you, Sellithar.”

If protocol can be cruel, it may also be a mercy. In private, she might have broken down. Here, she turned white as he. Then blood and rank and discipline succored her, and she answered with the same formal falsity, “Welcome home, my lord.”

She came with us to his apartments. As his body servants surged forward I felt his almost physical withdrawal, and understood. I too would have wanted to be alone. He smiled apologetically and said, “Kyvan, Ysk... I'm out of practice. Just tonight, will you let the general bed me down?”

Amid assurance and protestation they withdrew. I could not look at Sellithar. I knew if she tried to stay he would eject her, and I dared not imagine how. But she said at once, “Beryx, you must be exhausted. I'll see you tomorrow. Mind, you're not to get up until I do.”

Ouch, I thought, recalling Thassal's iron decrees. He dredged up a smile; I hurried to escape before the door closed. He said, “Harran?” He was rocking on his feet. It was the merest whisper. “Will you. . . go to the queen?”

Her porter refused me entrance. When I overrode him with a king's command, I knew she would not be there. I stood in the arches of the little hall paneled in blonde imlann wood, tiled with a mosaic in palest limes, azures, and smoky lavenders, gweldryx flying among terrian blooms. The air bore her dry light scent, a blend of keerphars. Looking out to the paven paths and pools of the lily garden, I thought: alone. Not in her rooms, probably not in the royal apartments, not where her presence or unescorted going would be remarked, certainly not where anyone could see. I went through the closing lilies, down the southern arbors, round to the little pleasance beneath my tower.

Sellithar was kneeling on the seat, elbows along the outer parapet, staring into the melted evening distance toward Tirs.

I went to her quickly. Then paused, and sat down. She did not move. I took my harp and played at random: an improvisation, what Beryx called “thinking noise.” A little wind rustled like dragon speech among the helliens.

“He would not let me come to Astarien.” She spoke dully, without looking round. “I wanted to. To nurse him.”

I made a soothing nothing on the harp.

“He never mentioned it.” Her voice was duller, dead. “If he had, I could have...” She broke off. I played a hurried attempt at consolation, at erasure of that one small terrible word.

She straightened up. Her profile was still, and set, and curiously calm. “He will never forgive me,” she said. “Not so long as I live.”

Music failed me too. I knew it was the truth. Beryx was a devoted king, a humane general, a loyal friend, a generous master, probably a loving spouse. He would support you, lead you, defend you, rally you, comfort you: quite cheerfully die for you, over and above forgiving you wounds to his body, soul, and dignity. But never a wound to his pride.

I opened my mouth, but my silence had already replied. She cried, “Oh, Harran!” and flung herself round in a tempest of tears.

It was treachery, perfidy, base and unforgivable: but when the woman you love in is your arms, in distress, in your trust and in want of comforting, I defy anyone to be any nobler than me.

Her tears were over long before I stopped kissing her, embracing her, babbling all the usual inanities. Presently she lifted her eyes, tear-drenched, blue as terrian flowers, and studied me as if we had never met before. My heart had stopped when she gave a quick, shy smile, outlined my lips with a finger, and ducked her head.

“Harran,” she said, when I let her speak again, “what shall we do?”

It was in my heart to say, Run away to Meldene and make you a harper's wife. But the heart is a very stupid organ at the best of times, whereas women are unfailingly full of wisdom, so I said nothing at all.

“I am,” she said, “the queen.”

I have remembered that, I said silently, these last three years.

“So...” she said.

“So,” I tried not to sound bitter, “I had better leave.”

She straightened in my arms, and I saw courage, maturity, accepted responsibility literally form before my eyes.

She kissed me. Then she said, “If you can bear it—I'd rather you were here. But...” her eyes filled with pain. “I have broken a real trust. I must not... break it in name.” She looked into my face. “Can you bear that, my dear?”

No! I wanted to yell. I have already borne enough! Then I recalled what she would bear tomorrow, what Beryx had already borne in that one day, and was ashamed. “If you ask it,” I said, “I can.”