Kings of the North (34 page)

N
ight after night Kieri’s sleep was troubled, though he could not remember specific dreams, only an undefined menace. He would have to do something, he realized, about the bones and their hints. He wasn’t ready for another trip to the ossuary, and didn’t want to ask the elves. Instead, he began asking who in the palace had known his sister or even his parents.

He started with Joriam, who was polishing the big brass ewers in his bathing room. The old man’s eyes lit up.

“Yes, my lord, I do remember. Your mother now, my lord, she was a beauty, she was. Fresh as a snowdrop, but strong, the way elves are. She didn’t ride just the air and water horses, but any color—she liked to match with your father when they rode out together. The two of them, on matched horses … it brought tears to the eyes.”

“Did the Lady come to visit often then?”

“No … I wouldn’t say that. At your birth, yes: said the elven needed some elven magic and upset the midwives no end.
Out with you all
, she said, and there was words spoken, I heard from one of the maids. And at Midsummer, of course, and usually Midwinter, bringing snow sprites.”

Kieri had never heard of snow sprites.

“All sparkly they are, in the dark. Elf-light I suppose. Swore it did not break the rule against fire … well, they aren’t warm at all. They dance.”

“Did they ever quarrel?”

Joriam’s face changed; he looked wary. “I wouldn’t like to say, my lord. I was young then, you know, and the queen was our queen, and the Lady was the Lady. And mothers and daughters, you may know, are not always in accord.”

“Joriam, I need to know … what did you see or hear?”

Joriam put down the rag and box of polish he had been using. “My lord … your mother had spirit, and she may have said more than she meant—”

“But she said …”

“I overheard—I shouldn’t have, but I was in here, cleaning the brass same as I am now. They knew it, but their voices rose anyway. She said your father was king, and the Lady must deal with him herself. She was not going to be—” Joriam blushed but went on. “—not going to be ruling him … between the sheets. And then the Lady said your mother would regret it.”

“And?”

“And then the Lady came to the door of the bathing room and told me to be gone and keep quiet. Forget what you heard, she said. I did not look at either of them as I came through the bedchamber; I could feel their magery beating at me.”

“Yet you did not forget.”

“No … my lord, I did not. For your mother said remember, and she was
my
queen.”

Kieri forced himself not to pace back and forth. Joriam looked anxious enough. “Joriam, I know you’re no gossiper, but this is a matter of importance to me and to the realm both. I have no parents left to guide me; when the gods send dreams or visions, I must find a way to interpret them.”

Joriam ducked his head. “My lord, you came from the bone-room in a state—”

“Yes. I learned things, but not enough. Not everything a king needs to know.”

“And you want me to tell you more.”

“Yes.”

“She was so beautiful,” Joriam said. “They both were, mother and daughter, but when they were angry, it was like a fire. Not often. The Lady … I think she did not understand how your mother could love your father. We all saw that. She had not married him from a duty to pass on the taig-sense; she truly loved him, and he loved her. She never put on airs with him, as the elves do so often. Never treated him as lesser. The Lady said, ‘You’re losing your nature,’ and your mother said, ‘I am what I am.’ ”

“Did she get along with other elves? My mother, I mean?”

“Some. Not all. There was some, you know, just like now, thought themselves too great to associate with humans at all. Your mother argued with them; they couldn’t nay-say her because she was the Lady’s own daughter, but they did say she was young and would learn better. Her brother, he was older—”

“Amrothlin?”

“I don’t know all those names, my lord. Only that another time, she said to the Lady, ‘You must tell my brother to treat the king with more respect.’ ”

Kieri shook his head.

“My lord?”

“No—I was scolding myself, Joriam, for not having asked you before about my parents and other matters. Only you have been such a quiet presence, and so many other matters claimed my attention …”

“If there’s more you need to know, you should talk to Tekko as well … you know, the old huntsman. And Erda, she was one of your mother’s maids. Dressed her hair and all.”

“Sir King?” Sarol, King’s Squire, spoke from the door.

“Yes?”

“There’s a courier come from Captain Talgan. I thought you’d want to know.”

“Joriam, thank you—and I will want to talk more with you later. And the others. It’s time I knew more about my family. But I must go now.” He followed Sarol downstairs, his mind leaping ahead to the Pargunese situation. He wished he could get reports from Cracolnya, who would surely have posted troops on the Tsaian-Pargunese border. Though Mikeli had agreed to send any information he had on Pargunese troop movements, so far that had produced nothing useful.

Talgan’s report included observations by forest rangers as well as his own troops: everything he had been able to glean about Pargunese activities both on the river and in Pargun itself.

“Do we have anyone who speaks Pargunese?” Kieri asked Sarol.

“I can’t,” Sarol said. “I don’t know if any of the Squires can … we’ve never thought we needed it.”

“We do now,” Kieri said. He knew Pargunese, but he could not spend days creeping around across the river to find out what they were up to. “I’ll write Talgan … surely some of the people who live along the river speak some Pargunese.”

Once again he felt torn between multiple demands. He needed to know what Pargun was up to—but he also needed to know about the elves. If he had to mount a defense against Pargun—if they invaded—he needed to know if the elves would help defend the taig or if they’d hide in the elvenhome and leave all the work to the humans. What did they really intend? What might explain the Lady’s behavior?

Over the next days, he found scraps of time to talk to the other older servants, retired and still active. Tekko the huntsman spoke of his mother’s prowess on horseback, with weapons. “Bold, not afraid of anything,” he said. “They told us she was ages older than your father, but she rode like a young girl. Armsmaster then—he died years back—told us she was fastest he’d seen with a blade. She never missed a shot with her bow. But your father, Sir King, was as good—the two of them, with just one huntsman to manage the hounds, could bring meat enough for a banquet. Fine pair, they were.”

Was that why she’d gone alone with him on that journey? he asked.

Tekko sucked his teeth. “Dunno, Sir King. There was talk. Some said she refused an escort of Squires, expecting to travel with elves—but we didn’t see them here. Your father, now, he was angry with himself he didn’t insist on Squires or Royal Archers. There was a Queen’s Squire said more, but she was killed in a riding accident not long after.”

“Riding accident?”

“Aye. Horse started bucking, there in the palace courtyard, finally went over backward. Broke her neck and its, both.” Tekko paused, then went on. “Odd, that was. You know the Squires’ mounts, all
well-trained. But everyone was still mourning the queen’s death; this seemed just another sorrow.”

A convenient accident, Kieri thought, but too long ago to leave useful clues lying about. He listened to the rest of Tekko’s tales, including that of the hound pup he’d long forgotten about, until someone interrupted them. After a few more conversations, he realized that some treachery had indeed taken place, but he was not at all sure whose. A lifetime of dealing with courts and councils had taught him how easy it was to foment quarrels, misdirect attention, cast blame on the wrong person.

Finally he called the Seneschal to his office one morning. “What I most need to know now,” he said, “is the limit of the bones’ knowledge. I have talked to others who knew my parents, and they remember things that seem to corroborate what the bones hinted. But can bones know more than the people who bore them?”

“No one knows for sure,” the Seneschal said. “I have not known them to convey anything beyond the lifetime of the flesh.”

“What I say now must stay between us for the time,” Kieri said.

“Of course, sire.”

“My sister’s bones hinted at treachery, treachery somehow related to our mother’s death—and that means treachery related to my captivity as well. I think my sister believed the Lady complicit in this.”

“The Lady!” The Seneschal’s eyes widened.

“And the thought of it made me sick,” Kieri said; even now his stomach cramped as he spoke of it. “I have talked, as I said, to others who were here at that time. I am not so sure who it was—but I am increasingly sure that treachery was involved. There was, at the least, tension between the Lady and my—our—mother. Someone else could have exploited that. Human or elf, but elf, I fear, is more likely.”

“Not a random attack by brigands?”

“No,” Kieri said. “By several accounts, she expected an elven escort on the journey—refused a human retinue—and as a full elf should have been able to enter the elvenhome with me if danger threatened. As well, she was skilled with weapons—she would not have been easy to take down. Yet she had no elven escort—they did not arrive when expected, and she chose to leave without them. A Squire who mentioned treachery at the time was soon thrown from her horse and killed. So treachery seems likely—but my sister’s suspicion
of our grandmother could be based on as little as a minor argument she overheard.”

“Your sister lived to adulthood,” the Seneschal said. “She could have heard more than you, firsthand, from those who knew your mother and the Lady.”

“My father’s bones have indicated no such suspicion,” Kieri said. “Would he not have known more?”

“Not … necessarily.” The Seneschal frowned. “Knowledge can pass from mother to daughter, or father to son, through bone and blood. Your sister might have some awareness of what your mother knew, from before your sister’s birth.”

“How is that possible?”

“I don’t know.” The Seneschal spread his hands. “In the old days, the old humans believed such was possible. That was one reason for raising the bones and honoring them. They had true wisdom that their descendants might share, at least in part. Certain knowledge and certain skills passed mother to daughter and father to son. Parrions, they called those.”

Kieri thought of something else. “Did you ever hear rumor that the Lady was unhappy at her daughter’s wedding a human? At the need to reintroduce taig-sense into the royal family?”

“No … though elves have always acted as if it were a greater honor to the king your father than to your mother. But I thought that natural.” The Seneschal paused, then went on. “Sir King, will you ask the Lady of these things?”

“If she will talk to me,” Kieri said. Bitterness flooded him again. “She can always hide there, in the elvenhome … and she has been doing just that.”

“It must be settled,” the Seneschal said. “It must be settled for the good of the realm … that is what the bones want, I am sure.”

“I will speak to Orlith,” Kieri said. “Or any elf I can find.”

But when he looked, he found none. Not Orlith, not Amrothlin his own uncle, none of them. His half-elven Squires, when he asked, said they thought all the elves were having a meeting in the elvenhome.

Vonja, in Aarenis

T
hree days before the contract was over, Arcolin camped outside the walls of Cortes Vonja and went into the city to deal with the Cortes Vonja Council. As he expected, they were not pleased that he hadn’t eliminated the threat, but after some hours, during which he showed the maps, the daily journal of activities, and the number of enemy killed, they agreed that he had done as well as a small force could. He turned in the money taken from the fallen brigands and the counterfeiting dies they’d found, as well as the ten Cortes Vonja pikes. They stared at those last as if they were vipers, not needing to be told what it meant that their weapons had shown up in enemy hands.

“We could hire you until the Fall Evener,” one councilman said.

“No,” Arcolin said. “I must attend Autumn Court in Tsaia; my king commands it. And I have scarce time to travel there as it is.”

“How long will you be here, then?”

“Only long enough to let the men spend a little money and complete the business I have with those who helped my sergeant.”