The Falcon Throne (The Tarnished Crown Series) (12 page)

“Are you
deaf
, you stupid bitch?” Vidar demanded, goaded past common sense. “Harald is done, Argante, and you’re done with him. Clemen has judged you, and Clemen spits you out like the rancid offal you are.”

With a shriek Argante leapt at him. This time it was Aistan who laid hands on her, swinging her off her dainty feet and shaking her like a ratting dog with its prey.

“Be silent, you spoiled slattern, or I’ll snap your pretty, worthless neck!”

“Aistan, no!” Shoving his sword at Humbert, Roric stepped in. “My lord, release her. This is the ducal court, not a shambles. Aistan!
Let her go!
”

Harald was on his feet, red-faced with fear and fury. “Aistan, you’re a dead man! I’ll dagger you myself and feed your hacked corpse to my hounds! You cur–you—”

Roric shoved him back into his chair. “Hold your tongue, Harald!
Aistan!
”

On a harsh, sobbing breath Aistan sprang his clutching hands wide. Argante slid to the tiled floor, weeping.

“Aistan?”

Aistan turned away, his face haggard. “I’m done, Roric. Finish this.”

“Finish this?” Argante looked up. Tears runnelled the chalk dust caked on her face. “Finish us, you mean. Why else are you here with swords?”

“To make sure you listen,” he said sharply. “We’ve not come to spill blood. Harald—”

Ignoring him, Harald pushed out of his chair. This time Roric let him go to his wife. Watching his cousin gently help Argante to stand, he felt an unexpected pang of sorrow.

“I never wanted this, Harald. None of it. You should’ve been a better man. There was Berold to guide you. Why did you take the path to ruin?”

Harald’s stare was vicious. “I don’t answer to you.
Bastard
.”

“He means to kill us, Harald,” Argante said, clinging. “He means to
kill our son.” Her hands flew to her mouth. “Liam could be dead already, butchered in his cradle!”

“He’s not!” Roric said, as Harald blanched. “We have no quarrel with an infant.”

She shook her head, eyes glistening with tears. “I don’t believe you.”

“Then see for yourself. Humbert, go with her.”

“I will go,” said Harald. “Liam is my heir.”

“Argante goes, or no one.” Roric held out his hand. “Humbert?”

Stepping forward, Humbert gave back the sword he held in trust then offered Argante a brief bow. “My lady? Lead the way.”

“Go,” said Harald, curtly. “Bring Liam to me.”

Argante hesitated. “But—”

“
Bring him!
”

With a last hate-filled glare, Argante fled the hall, leaving Humbert to lumber in her wake.

“Your son is safe, Harald,” Roric said, feeling the heavy stares of the silently watching lords. “How could you think otherwise? That I’d harm him? Liam is family.”

Harald snorted, derisive. “You seek to steal his birthright, Roric. My son is dreadfully harmed.”

“Its loss is your fault, not mine. I never told you to rule Clemen with your sword-point pressed to its throat.”

Harald looked at Aistan, then Vidar, up to Farland, Morholt and Hankin in the minstrels’ gallery then back down to the other lords ranged against him.

“My lords!” he said, his voice raised. “Is there not a one of you who’ll stand with me against this upstart?”

A long and terrible silence. Not even Ercole answered. Instead, Argante’s brother stared at the floor.

“I see,” Harald said at last. “So it’s to be exile?”

Roric nodded. “With money enough, and comforts. Liam will want for nothing, Harald.”

“Nothing save his birthright! Tell me, Roric, where do you suggest that I—”

“
Murderer! Bastard murderer!
”

Startled, Roric turned to see the watching lords and their ladies cry alarm and scatter, the pages yelp and fling themselves to safety… and Argante, no sign of Humbert, running breathless towards him with a bloodied sword in her hands.

“
Murderer!
” she screamed again, her gold headdress discarded, her hair unpinned and flying, her blue velvet dress stained black and red. “Liam’s dead and burned in his cradle and Heartsong’s set afire! Harald–Harald—”

Roaring in anguished rage, Harald threw himself forward. Roric dropped his sword and took the weight of his cousin, grunting as a clenched fist caught him in the eye. Half-blinded he swung them both about to see Argante still running, still screaming, her stolen sword raised to strike.

“Vidar–Vidar, no,
don’t
—”

Vidar’s blade ran her through, neatly, with barely a sound.

“
Argante!
” Abandoning Harald, Roric tried to catch his cousin’s wife as slowly, so slowly, she slid off Vidar’s sword. But dismay robbed him of strength. Blood flowed from the killing wound as Argante slipped from his grasp and struck the red-and-white tiled floor. The sword she’d foolishly brandished clattered beside her, useless.

He looked up, his vision blurred. “Vidar…”

“You’re welcome,” Vidar said, sounding sour. His one good eye glinted. “Roric, she was no sweeter than a—”

Aistan’s shout and the change in Vidar’s scarred face spun him round.
Harald
. But whose sword was that he–

“Here!” said Vidar. “Now end this!”

Roric snatched Vidar’s offered, blood-wet blade and barely managed to clash it across the sword in frenzied Harald’s grasp. His own sword, his knight-gift, tossed aside without thinking.

“Don’t, Harald,” he panted, fighting to hold his ground. “I’d not—”

With a practised flick of iron-strong wrists, his face bestial with grief, Harald deflected the blocking blade and slashed his stolen sword in a swift, lethal sweep. Roric twisted as he parried, felt sharp pain as the passing blade caught him, drove links of mail through padding and into tender flesh. Dimly he heard someone shout, heard women scream, saw lords and ladies scuttle to the far reaches of the hall. Dimly he saw Vidar and Aistan, helpless, able only to watch.

Blow after blow he blocked, feeling each heavy shock shudder through his forearms, into his shoulders, rattle his teeth. This was no tilt yard game, full of laughter and teasing. Harald was trying to kill him.

I never wanted this.

They ranged about the Great Hall, filling the air with furious sound. Turned the castle into a smithy, steel ringing against steel. Sweat dripped,
chests heaved, shod feet slid and scrabbled on the smooth floor. A stinging hint of tainted smoke. Had Argante told the truth, then? Was the castle on fire? Someone had dragged her body away. White tiles were smeared red. Roric sobbed for air as Harald beat him across the place where his wife died, beat him onto the dais and off it, smashing the gilded chair to kindling, beat him nearly into the fire and howled in furious disappointment when a killing thrust failed.

“
Take him, Roric! Finish it! There’s no saving him now!
”

Humbert.

He blocked another sword-thrust, grunting at the pain. His throat felt raw, his lungs shredded. His bones threatened to break. But Harald was the older man… and he was tiring too. Was tiring faster. His face was grey, and slicked with sweat. Slash. Parry. Block. Deflect. Slash—

Harald stumbled, going down hard on one knee. His head snapped up, eyes wide with pain, lips bloodied from a bitten tongue.

“
Roric
—”

“Forgive me, cousin,” he whispered, and pushed Vidar’s bloodied sword through Harald’s unprotected heart.

^“
R
oric
.”

For one dreadful moment, Roric thought it was his cousin speaking, enchanted back to life. But then a hand touched his slumped shoulder.

“Come, boy,” Humbert said, full of sombre grief. “With me.”

He felt his breath hitch.
Liam.
“No. Humbert,
no
. He was an infant, he was helpless. He
can’t
be—”

Humbert shook his head. “You must come.”

Of course. Vision blurred, he looked around the hall, at the court’s silent
lesser lords and ladies then at Aistan and the other great lords, and the men-at-arms staring down from the gallery. “Remain here till I return. All of you. And don’t be afraid. I’m not my cousin. You’re safe with me.”

Leaving Vidar to retrieve his sword, and guard dead Harald, Roric climbed stair after winding stair until he reached Heartsong’s nursery. It was still smouldering, oil lamps over-turned and broken, candles trampled, the smoke-thick air sickening with the stench of burned bedding, burned furs, burned tapestries and heavy curtains and brightly painted furniture.

Burned flesh.

Eyes streaming, forearm pressed to nose and mouth, he made himself step over the charred men on the floor, over the charred remains of the wet nurse and Lady Morda, and face what lay in the smoky ruins of the cradle.

“Liam.”

A dazzle of memories, sharp as shattered glass.

Harald cradling his newborn son, tears on his cheeks… Argante kissing her babe’s forehead, her hard eyes softened with love… his own love, unexpected and fierce, as he held his cousin’s child, so afraid of letting the little one fall… Liam, smiling up at him…

“Roric!”

Choking on bile, he flung away from the babe’s burst, bubbled flesh and seared bones. Humbert followed him out of the nursery and into the torchlit corridor beyond, saying nothing as he bent double to heave and spit.

At length he straightened, wincing as his bruised, battered body groaned in protest. A sharp sting, as his bloodied linen undershirt pulled away from his skin. The side of his face and his eye ached fiercely, where Harald’s fist had caught him. He wanted to weep, but couldn’t in front of Humbert. On a shuddering breath, he looked at his foster-lord.

“I know, boy,” said Humbert, his own composure challenged. “It’s wicked.”

“Three dead men,” he said, his voice rasping. “At least one of them must be Harald’s. He never left Liam without a man-at-arms nearby.” He felt his breathing hitch. “Spirits, Humbert. Could they
all
be his men? Did our men slay Harald’s men-at-arms, slay Liam and Morda and the wet nurse, then set fire to the nursery to burn any trace of their crime before fleeing?”

“No,” Humbert said fiercely. “Roric, why must this be murder? It’s more likely to be mischance.”

“
Mischance
?” He nearly laughed. “You can’t believe that,.”

“One man seduced to disobey you, I can believe. Just. One man, taking his companions unaware. But a clutch of traitors in our midst?” Humbert shook his head. “That I won’t believe.

“Harald claimed
he
had a clutch of traitors in his midst.”

“Don’t,” Humbert commanded. “Harald was the traitor here. Everything he touched, he tarnished.”

He could still feel his sword sliding through Harald’s heart. See the light of life dying out of his cousin’s shocked eyes. His belly heaved again, fresh bile rising. He didn’t want to think about Harald.

“Once we’ve tallied our men, and Harald’s, we’ll know who lies dead,” said Humbert, breaking the heavy silence. “But more than that? I’m sorry, boy. Best you make peace with the notion we might never know how this unfolded. Not for certain.”

“Make peace with it?” Roric stared, outrage overcoming sickness. “Humbert, I said plainly Liam wasn’t to be touched. And now he’s
dead
. Harald’s son. You’ll never convince me this was mischance. Someone I brought here in good faith has betrayed me. How can I make peace with that?”

“How you do it is your affair. But if there is a villain here, and if we don’t unmask him swiftly, then make peace with it you must. Aistan and the other lords won’t stomach harsh suspicion. They had a bellyful of that with Harald.”

True. And if he even so much as
hinted
at ruling like his cousin…

“Make no mistake,” Humbert added. “You need Aistan and the others to help you stamp your authority on Clemen. But to earn their trust you have to trust them. If ever they doubt you, this new house we’re building will tumble to ruins at our feet.”

“And what of Liam?” Seeing again that ghastly cradle and its dreadful, stinking burden, Roric dragged a hand down his bruised face. Welcomed the clean physical pain that caused, better by far than the soul-sickness of a slaughtered infant. “Doesn’t an innocent babe deserve justice? Vengeance?”

“Not if justice and vengeance come at the expense of this duchy.”

“Clemen’s people will expect me to avenge the murder of my own flesh and blood!”

“You can’t say for sure it’s murder.”

“
You
can’t say for sure it isn’t! And if—”

“
Roric
.” Heavy-handed, Humbert took hold of his shoulder. “Think like a duke, not a man. No good can come of whipping up mopish sentiment
for Harald’s brat. Or in stirring Aistan and the rest with accusations of treachery. I know it sits sour, but in this mucky matter we’ll best be served by never learning what happened.”

And to think he’d thought the night couldn’t grow any worse. “So you’re saying I’m to wink at misdoing if it suits? Explain how that doesn’t make me Harald!”

Humbert growled. “Don’t you go pushing words between my teeth.”

“My lord, there’s a hall full of people downstairs who heard what Argante said, who
know
—”

“
Nothing
,” said Humbert, still glaring. “Beyond what we choose they should know. They’ll believe what we tell them, Roric.”

“How so sure, my lord?”

“Because they’ll want to.”

Half-blind with nausea, Roric knocked his foster-lord’s hand from his shoulder and turned aside. “Humbert—”

“Tell me I’m wrong,” said Humbert, pitiless. “Show me one lord who doesn’t want this misery put behind us. Then tell me the peace of Clemen isn’t worth such a trifle.”

He spun round. “
The truth is no trifle!
”

“Roric, you’re a fool if you think a one of them will shed a tear for that dead babe.”

Staring at Humbert, he felt a different grief welling.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this
. “All the more reason for me to care.”

“You don’t have the luxury of caring! Not like that. What kind of shepherd kills his whole flock for the pity of one sick sheep?”

“We’re not talking about sheep!”

“I know what we’re talking about, boy! Do you?”

His legs were shaking, worse than when he’d faced his first run at the ring in the tilt yard. His first blade unsheathed against him in anger. Humbert, his second father, was suddenly a stranger.

“You’re glad Liam’s dead.”

Humbert fisted his blunt hands on his hips. “I’m glad he’ll not grow to be a rallying point for traitors. And like it or not, boy, we both know that was always a danger.”

Perhaps, but it didn’t make the nursery bloodshed any easier to stomach. Or his foster-lord’s pragmatism any less brutal. Exhausted, all the pains in his body clamouring louder than ever, Roric took a deep breath and made himself stand straight.

“Fine. We’ll do this your way. For now. But I still think someone
betrayed me tonight, Humbert. And you know I can’t rest till I know the man’s name.”

“And I think you’re mistaken. But I’ll look into it. You have my word.” Softening, Humbert sighed. “Roric… we knew from the outset this would be hard.”

Hard? He’d been ready for hard. Not for a moment had he thought Harald would let go of his duchy easily. But never in his deepest doubtings had he thought so much blood would be spilled. Loving Humbert, and in this stark moment thoroughly disliking him, he shook his head.

“What’s happened tonight is an ill omen.”

“
No
,” said Humbert, and pointed a finger. “Roric, I give you fair warning. Don’t you start with any superstitious shite.”

“It is an ill omen,” he insisted. “And its shadow will stain me for ever. Harald dead. Argante dead. And innocent Liam…”

Humbert thrust his bristled beard close. “Vidar killed Argante, and with good reason. The bitch was mad with grief. As for Harald, it was his choice to pick up a sword. No one can blame you for defending yourself.”

For all he was a man grown, and blooded in the Marches, that look in Humbert’s eye could make him quail as though he were seven years old again and caught in mischief. Was it the same for all men who yet had a father living? If so, then he should envy Vidar.

“And Liam?”

“I said it,” Humbert replied, his jaw tight. “Babes die. Harald’s brat could as easily have perished of plague. Now come, Your Grace. Steady yourself. There’s much to be done before we can ride home to Eaglerock.”

Your Grace.

Feeling anything but graceful, feeling sore and sorrowful and soiled, Roric surrendered. “Yes, my lord.”

“And first of our tasks,” said Humbert, in the voice that allowed no argument, “is deciding what tale we tell those lords milled about downstairs…”

Waiting for Roric and Humbert to return, Vidar tried to ignore the cacophany of pains wracking his flesh and bones. Since his ruination in the Marches–and it would be four years gone come Summer Rise, time running so fast, as he no longer could–not a day had passed without some kind of pain in it. At first he’d thought he must lose his wits. He’d not imagined any man could live with such constant, cruel suffering. But
it turned out the leech treating him hadn’t been an arrant liar after all. After a few months the scarlet screaming dimmed to a pale whisper, mostly, and mostly he’d learned how to ignore it. He took powdered willow bark on the whispery days, oil of lantrin when he had no choice, and was careful not to demand more from his scarred, half-butchered body than it could give. Well. Usually he was careful. But the hard ride to Heartsong couldn’t be avoided. It had punished him, and thrusting a sword through Argante had only made the pain worse.

If he’d been alone he might’ve succumbed to the torment and groaned out loud. Swallowed more lantrin than was safe and endured the mad fever-dreams that followed. But he wasn’t alone, and revealing the extent of his weakness before the men his foolish father had affronted was akin to cutting his own throat.

So, to distract himself, he watched Clemen’s anxious northern lords and their quietly weeping wives without seeming to pay them any attention at all. One of his father’s neat tricks, that. A pity Godebert had forgotten it, or else grown careless in its use. If he’d been sharper in his wits he might still be alive. The old fulmet.

He let his vaguely roaming gaze touch on the cooling corpse of Godebert’s murderer. Harald had fought well, but Roric had fought better. For all his protestations of wanting to keep the bastard alive, he’d shoved a sword through the poxed mongrel neatly enough… which meant he could be ruthless if he had to. A point worth remembering. And likely it meant he’d not mourn Harald over-long. Or Argante. Or the babe.

Thought of Liam tripped his heart, set it beating a little faster. He was beginning to regret not dealing with Harald’s son himself. The man he’d bribed to his service, sworn to Humbert but soured over an old slighting, had seemed safe enough. But with the deed done, niggling doubt was creeping in. Was the fear of a fearful death enough to keep the spiteful man-at-arms honestly suborned? Was the coin he’d paid the man, coin he couldn’t easily part with, sufficiently purse-heavy that greed wouldn’t tempt him to a little black dealing?

Because if he’d misjudged the bastard…

On the far side of the hall, Aistan stood deep in murmured conversation with the lords Hankin, Morholt and Farland. Clemen’s mighty southern barons hadn’t invited him to join their huddle. It seemed that till Roric said otherwise, Harald’s tainting of him would hold true. His heart tripped again, thinking on it. Roric’s promise he’d be restored to his inheritance was why he’d risked his life in this dangerous venture. Not even the chance
to avenge his dead father had counted more than his hope of claiming the woman he lived for. Breathed for.
Lindara
. He had no chance of winning Humbert’s daughter without first being washed clean of Godebert’s enduring stain. And achieving his absolution had meant helping Roric rid Clemen of Harald. Yes, and ridding it of Harald’s innocent son, too.

Now the thing was done, never to be undone. Clemen was saved from a tyrant and civil war, and Lindara was his. At last.

The thought almost had him smiling, despite the pain. He pinched his lips to kill it. He’d be thought most odd, smiling in the midst of blood and death. Then hidden joy gave way to surprise, as Aistan left his brother barons and crossed the hall towards him. A moment’s hesitation as he passed by Ercole, sat on the tiled floor with his half-sister’s body draped over his knees. Was the little shite’s tear-stained grief genuine? Perhaps. Or perhaps Ercole wept for his purse, which would empty soon enough without Argante’s influence to keep it filled.

“My lord,” Vidar said, as Aistan joined him.

Aistan nodded. “Vidar.” Dispassionate, he looked at dead Harald, neatly composed at their feet. “So,” he murmured. “The whole rotten family cut down, root and stock. A good night’s work, yes?”

“I doubt Roric thinks so.”

“Roric has a tender heart.”

“Not a fatal flaw, surely?”

“You think so?” Aistan’s heavy brows lowered. “A tender heart beats most usefully in a woman’s breast, Vidar. Not a man’s.”

“True,” he agreed. “But you’ll not fault our new duke for a little regret. Family is family, my lord. Even when it strays.”

A brief quirk of his lips showed Aistan understood, perhaps appreciated, the veiled reference to Godebert. “Anyone who regrets Harald’s death is a fool. Argante’s too. She was a vain, greedy bitch.”