Hall of the Mountain King (4 page)

Adjan inspected his damply naked person with no expression
that he could discern. In spite of himself he began to be afraid. When Adjan
roared in rage, all was well. But when he was silent, then it was wisest to
run.

Vadin could not be wise. He could not even cover his
shriveling privates.

After an eternity the arms master said, “Dry yourself and
report to me. Full livery. Without,” he added acidly, “your spear.”

oOo

Vadin dried himself and dressed with all the care his
shaking hands could muster. He was beginning to think again, after a fashion.
He kept seeing Mirain’s face. Damn it, the foreigner had sent him away. Ordered
him in no uncertain terms, and barred the door behind him. What had the little
bastard done, brewed up a mess of sorceries over the bedroom hearth?

He braided his hair so tightly it hurt, flung the scarlet
cloak over his shoulders, and went to face his master.

Adjan was standing in the cubicle that served him as both
workroom and bedchamber. On the battered stool that the squires called the
throne of judgment sat the king.

Vadin came very close to disgracing himself and all his
house. Came within a twitch of turning and bolting, and if he had, he would not
have stopped until he came to Imehen.

Pride alone held him back, pride and Adjan’s black grim
stare. His body snapped itself to full attention, and stayed there while the
king examined him. He was raw with all the scrutiny, and growing angry. Was he
a prize colt, that all these people should memorize his every line?

His majesty raised a brow—gods, precisely like Mirain—and
said to Adjan, “He has promise, I grant you. But this demands performance.”

“He can perform,” the arms master said, no more smoothly or
politely than he ever did. “Are you questioning my judgment?”

“I am pointing out that this task would challenge a seasoned
soldier, let alone a boy in his first year of service.”

“And I say that’s to his advantage. He’ll keep up his
training; he’ll simply be assigned to a different duty.”

“Day and night, Captain. Whatever befalls.”

“Maybe nothing.”

“Maybe death. Or worse.”

“He’s young; he’s brighter than he looks; and he’s
resilient. Where an older man would break, he’ll bend and spring back stronger
than before. I say he’s the best choice, sire. You won’t find a better in the
time you’re allowing.”

The king stroked his beard, frowning at Vadin, hardly seeing
him except as a tool for the task. Whatever it was.

Vadin’s heart was pounding. Something high and perilous;
some great and glorious deed, as in the songs. For that his father had sent him
here. For that he had prayed. He was no longer afraid; he was ready to sing.

“Vadin of Geitan,” the king said at last, his voice like
drums beating, “your commander has persuaded me. You shall continue to train
among my squires, but you are no longer in my service. Henceforth you are the
liege man of the Prince Mirain.”

Vadin was not hearing properly. No longer serving the
king—serving the prince—Moranden? There was only one prince in the castle.
There could not be—

“Mirain,” said the king relentlessly, “stands in need of a
good and loyal man. He has come late and all unlooked for; he is godly wise,
but I do not think that he knows truly what he faces here. I call on you to be
his guide and his guard.”

High. Honorable. Perilous. Vadin wanted to laugh. Nursemaid
to a priestess’ bastard. He would dare death, oh yes, death by stoning or
poison when Ianon turned against the upstart.

The king was not asking him to choose. He was a thing; a
servant. A half-trained hound, mute and helpless while his master handed his
lead to a new owner.

No, he thought. No. He would speak. He would stalk away.

Go home, no, he could not do that to his father or his poor
proud mother, but maybe the prince would take him. The true prince, the man who
had time to smile at a guard or speak to a squire in the market or greet a boy
coming new and homesick and scared into a city greater than he had ever dreamed
of. Moranden had taken the edge off his terror, made him feel like a lord and a
kinsman, and better yet, remembered him thereafter. Moranden would be glad of
his service.

“Go now,” the king said. “Guard my grandson.”

Vadin gathered himself to cry out. Found himself bowing low,
mute, obedient. Went as, and where, he was commanded.

oOo

The foreigner was gone. For a blissful instant Vadin knew
that he had changed his mind; he had escaped while he could. Then Vadin thought
to go to the window Mirain had seemed so fond of, and there were the braid and
the torque and the girl-smooth face, exploring the garden.

Vadin took a long moment to steel himself. At last he went
down.

Mirain had folded himself on the grass, bent over his cupped
hands. When Vadin’s shadow blocked the sun he looked up.

“See,” he said, raising his hands a little, carefully.
Something fluttered in them, small and vividly blue, with a flash of scarlet at
the throat and on the iridescent wings.

The dragonel scaled the pinnacle of Mirain’s forefinger and
coiled there, wings beating gently for balance. Mirain laughed softly. The
creature echoed him four octaves higher. With blurring suddenness it took wing,
darting away into a tangle of fruitthorn.

Mirain stretched and sighed and smiled his sudden smile. “I
never thought northerners were a folk for gardens.”

“We’re not.” Vadin tried an insolence: he dropped beside the
other, full livery and all. Mirain chose to pay no attention. “The king had it
made for the yellow woman—for the queen. She pined amid all our bare stone.
Herd fields weren’t enough, and the women’s courts were too severe with their
herbs and such. She had to have flowers.” His lip curled a little as he said
it.

“The yellow woman,” Mirain repeated. “Poor lady, she died
before my mother could know her. I understand that she was very beautiful but
very fragile, like a flower herself.”

“So the singers say.”

Mirain plucked a scarlet blossom. He had small hands for a
man, but the fingers were long and tapering, with a touch as delicate as a
girl’s.

They closed over the flower. When they opened they cupped a
hard green fruit. It ripened swiftly, darkening and swelling and speckling with
gold.

He held the thornfruit under Vadin’s nose. Thornfruit in
spring, real as his own staring eyes, with its sweet potent scent, its
suggestion of a blush.

“Yes,” said Mirain, “I am a mage, a born master; I need no
spells to work my magics, only a firm will.”

A sun kindled in his hand. The fruit vanished. Mirain
clasped his knees and rocked, and regarded Vadin, and waited. For what? Abject
submission? Cowering terror?

“Plain acceptance,” the mage said, dry as old leaves.

Vadin gave him red rage. “Get out of my mind!”

Mirain raised a cheer. “Bravo, Vadin! Obey my grandfather,
endure me, but keep your rebellion alive. I do detest a servile servant.”

“Why?” demanded Vadin. “One word of power and I’m your ensorceled
slave.”

“Why?” Mirain echoed him. “By the king’s orders you’re mine
already.” He sat erect, suddenly grim. “Vadin alVadin, I do not accept
unwilling service. For one thing, it hurts my head. For another, it’s an
invitation to assassination. But I will not stoop to win your willingness with
my power. If your loyalties lie elsewhere, go to them. I can settle matters
with the king.”

Vadin’s anger changed as Mirain spoke. He had been close to
hate. He was still, but to a different side of it, a side much closer to his
pride. Instead of roaring or howling or striking out, he heard himself say
coldly, “You’re a supercilious little bastard, do you know that?”

“I can afford to be,” Mirain answered.

Vadin laughed in spite of himself. “Sure you can. You’re
planning to be king of the world.” He stood and planted his hands on his hips.
“What makes you think you can get rid of me? I’m a good squire, my lord. I
served my master loyally; my master gave me to you. Now I’m your man. Your
loyal man, my lord.”

Mirain’s eyes widened and fixed; his chin came up. “I refuse
your service, sir.”

“I refuse your refusal, my lord.” I am an idiot, my very
unwelcome lord.

“You most certainly are.” That stopped Vadin short; Mirain
grinned like a direwolf. “Very well, sir defiance. You are my man, and may the
god have mercy on your soul.”

The king’s summons came at evening, and with it a robe of
honor, royal white embroidered with scarlet and gold.

Someone had been cutting and stitching: it fit Mirain
admirably. He preened in it, vain as a sunbird; and he did look well. He had
his hair braided differently, Ianyn prince’s braid, although he had not let the
servant add the twist that marked the royal heir.

“I’m not that yet,” he said, “and I may never be.”

Vadin restrained a snort, which Mirain pretended not to
hear.

The servant struggled with the heavy black mane. Freed, it
was as outrageous as its bearer’s moods; it curled with abandon, and it had a
life of its own, a will to escape the grimly patient fingers and run wild down
Mirain’s back. A brand of his Asanian blood, like his smallness, like his
dancer’s grace.

At last the servant won his battle. Mirain applauded him;
young man that he was, he broke into a smile, swiftly controlled.

It was almost amusing to see how easily these bondmen fell
into Mirain’s hand. His glittering golden hand.

oOo

The king sat enthroned in the great hall with before and
below him the lords and chieftains of his court, gathered for the evening
feast. He rose as Mirain entered; the rest rose perforce, a royal greeting.

Mirain stood straight in the face of it and met the old
king’s gaze, that was dark and keen and quietly exultant, filled with a welcome
as fierce as it was joyous. “Mirain of Han-Gilen,” he said in a ringing voice,
“son of my daughter. Come, sit by me; share the honor of the feast.”

Mirain bowed and advanced down the long hall through a
spreading silence. His back was erect, his chin up. Unconsciously Vadin,
following in his wake, matched his bearing and his steadiness.

The king’s hand clasped Mirain’s and set him to the right of
the throne, in a seat but little lower. The heir’s place.

Eyes glittered; voices murmured. Not in thrice seven years
had that chair been filled.

Mirain sat very still in it, as if the slightest movement
might send him leaping into flight. Vadin could almost taste his tension.

Surely he had planned for this. But now that he had it, it
seemed he was human enough to have a doubt or two.

His fist had clenched in his lap. A muscle had knotted in
his jaw. He raised his chin another degree, to imperial hauteur, and held it
there.

The king sat beside him. A sigh ran through the hall as the
court returned to their seats. Their lord raised a hand.

The door of the hall flew open. Figures filled it. Prince
Moranden strode through them, resplendent in scarlet and in mountain copper.
Tall even for a northerner and broad with it, he towered above the seated
nobles. The men with him, lords, warriors, servants, passed insubstantial as
shadows. But their eyes gleamed.

He stalked to the dais and halted before the king. “Your
pardon for my lateness, sire. The hunt kept me away longer than I had looked
for.”

The king sat too still, spoke too gently. “Sit then, and let
the feast begin.”

“Ah, Father,” Moranden said, “you waited for me. It was
courteous, but you had no need.”

“Indeed, sir, we did not. Will you sit?”

Still the prince lingered. As if for the first time, his
eyes found Mirain. Stopped; widened.

They were all innocent surprise, and yet Vadin’s blood ran
cold from heart to clenched fists. “What, Father! A guest? You do him great
honor.” His eyes narrowed; his lips thinned. “Nay, nay, I had forgotten. The
boy who came this morning, the little priest from the south with the news we’ve
all dreaded for so long. Shouldn’t we be mourning instead of feasting?”

“One does not mourn a priestess whom the god has taken to
himself.” Mirain’s voice was soft and steady, but higher than it should have
been, the voice of a boy just come to manhood.

It was well feigned. A stranger would have heard the
youthful tenor with its hint of uncertainty, as if it would break on the next
word, and seen the clear-skinned beardless face, and taken it all for what it
seemed.

It seemed that Moranden did. His tension eased. The fire of
wrath sank to an ember, swiftly banked in ash. He walked easily around the dais
to settle beside the heir’s place.

It was not his wonted seat. Even in the lower chair he
dwarfed his sister-son. “Well, lad,” he said with hearty good humor, “are you
pleased with the hospitality of Han-Ianon?”

“I am well content,” Mirain answered him, as ingenuous as
he, “and pleased to greet you at last, uncle.”

“Uncle?” asked Moranden. “Are we kin?”

“Through my mother. Your sister Sanelin. Is it not her place
I sit in?”

Moranden had taken half a loaf of bread and begun to break
it. It crumbled in his tensed fingers, falling unheeded to his plate. “So,” he
said, “that’s what kept her. Who was her lover? A prince? A beggar? Some fellow
pilgrim?”

“No mortal man.”

“I suppose everyone believed that. At least until she died.
Or did they kill her?”

“They did not.” Mirain turned slightly, with an effort Vadin
could just see; he took up a bit of meat and began slowly to eat it.

“She left you alone then,” Moranden said, “and you came to
us. Not much welcome anywhere for a priestess’ bastard, is there?”

“I am not a bastard.” Mirain’s voice was as calm as ever,
but it had dropped an octave.