The Gypsy King (40 page)

Nigh about midnight, the visibly exhausted king formally took his leave of the court. As soon as he was gone, the Great Hall began to clear out—the married ladies retiring to their chambers, their husbands retreating into the shadows to talk business and intrigue, and the drunk and merry young people drifting toward smaller common rooms or out into the night to seek mischief under the cover of darkness.

Bidding the Regent good night before he had a chance to suggest that she do other than retire to her chamber like the proper married lady she was, Persephone quickly made her way toward the back of the Great Hall. About halfway across the room, as she was manoeuvring around a silver fountain in the shape of a goddess, she heard several young noblewomen on the other side of the fountain gossiping about the morning's hunt.

“… I thought I would
die
from laughter. I really did!” giggled one.

“So did I,” said another. “Did you see the look on her face when that beast she was riding jumped the spit hog?”

More giggles.

“I'm just sorry the saddle didn't slip,” chirped a third, one that Persephone instantly recognized as the tiny, birdlike Lady Aurelia. “I thought you were going to see to it that that half-wit groom loosened the buckle.”

“He wouldn't do it,” replied the first. “Not for a gold sovereign—not even for a kiss!” Several small screams of unkind laughter. “The fool said that if she were to break her neck in a fall that had been deliberately caused, his life wouldn't be worth two strings of cat gut.”

“As if it's worth more than that in any event,” said the second.

More laughter. And then, slyly, “How do you suppose the Regent enjoyed sharing his married lady friend with the king this evening?”

“Not at all, I'm sure, but she played it well.”

“Of course she played it well,” snapped Lady Aurelia. “She's a whore—that's what whores do. Honestly, did you
see
the way she simpered at the king?”

“If he's the king,” interjected the lady who'd spoken second. “I mean, the
true
king.”

“He is the true king,” insisted Lady Aurelia. “It is treason to suggest otherwise.”

A burble of laughter. “You only say that because your great and powerful father means to marry you to him.
My
father says that someday a witness to the events in that birthing chamber will be found, and when that happens—”

“It will not happen,” said Lady Aurelia flatly.

“Well, then perhaps Lady Bothwell will find some way to free herself from that decrepit old husband of hers so that
she
can marry the king,” suggested the second lady coyly.

“That will not happen either,” snapped Lady Aurelia, “for within five minutes of meeting her, my father had dispatched men to the Ragorian Prefecture to find out all that he could about her. If there is dirt, they will find it; if there is not, they will make it up. Either way, if she makes a single serious move toward the king, my father will have what he needs to destroy her utterly.”

“Oh, Aurelia, you are
such
a charmer…,” laughed the first lady as the three of them drifted away, leaving Persephone badly shaken and wondering just how long she had before Lord Bartok's men arrived back with something far more devastating than dirt:

The truth.

THIRTY-TWO

L
ATER THAT SAME NIGHT, as he slowly made his way down the weeping, winding stone steps to the dungeon, Mordecai lamented yet again the necessity of having the place
quite
so deep beneath the castle. True, it spared him having to listen to the tiresome noises of those being questioned or punished, and it ensured that his guests never left except under armed escort or in pieces— knowledge that invariably added to both their terror and their willingness to cooperate—but
still
. The narrow, slippery stairs were treacherous, Mordecai suffered from the dampness, it smelled atrocious and there was always
something
scuttling about in the darkness.

As he continued down the torch-lit staircase, grimacing from time to time as yet another well-fed rat ambled to one side to let him pass, Mordecai thought about the evening that had just passed.
Obviously
, he'd been murderous when the king had informed him that he'd not be dining in private with Lady Bothwell—not only because the king had
dared
to interfere in his personal life, but also because the royal
fool had obviously conceived an affection for the lady, and Mordecai could not imagine how he, withered and twisted as he was, would ever be able to compete romantically with such a strong and handsome young king.

But then the most extraordinary thing had happened: in a court where ambitious young noblewomen routinely flopped onto their backs if the king so much as looked at them sideways, Lady Bothwell had chosen instead to make it clear that she had
not
conceived such an affection for the king as he had for her. Oh, she'd been polite and attentive enough to the king, Mordecai supposed, but no more polite or attentive than she'd been to him. Less polite and attentive, actually, because she'd gone to special effort to offer him choice morsels off her own plate—something she hadn't bothered to do for the king. Moreover, when the king had gotten up to dance, she had demurred, saying that she was yet bruised from her fall. Ha! Even now, Mordecai could hardly keep from laughing aloud at the king's gullibility. Of course that was not the reason she had refused him—obviously, she had refused him because she knew it was her
duty
to sit quietly beside her future husband! And when the king had returned to beg her to reconsider, she'd played the perfect courtier, catering to his vanity and filling his head with empty promises.

Truly, she was a woman without equal.

With that happy thought, Mordecai finally reached the bottom of the stairs. There, his happy thought vanished at the sound of something far bigger than a rat scurrying toward him. Suddenly afraid, he was about to try to lurch back up the stairs when two filthy, hooded slaves—each
carrying an empty burlap sack—burst out of the mouth of one of the darkened corridors leading away from the place where the crippled Regent now stood.

“Halt!” he barked, panting and clutching his heart. “What do you think you're doing?”

The slaves—who, an instant earlier, had looked as though they thought Satan himself was after them— looked considerably more terrified now.

“F-f-feeding the p-p-prisoners, Your G-g-grace!” stammered one. “W-we was s-s-sent d-d-down wif s-ssacks of b-b—”

“Bread, fool,” interrupted Mordecai, despising a world that gave a useless, babbling moron like
this
two strong legs and a straight back and allowed one such as himself to remain a cripple. Still breathing heavily, he stared at the man and his companion with undisguised loathing. “Well, what are you waiting for?” he finally snarled. “A cell of your own?”

Without a word—and with the quickness of small animals accustomed to narrow escapes—the two hooded slaves darted past Mordecai and disappeared up the stairs.

Sourly, Mordecai watched them go. Then he shuffled into the mouth of the corridor in front of him. After some paces, he came to a heavy wooden door. Ignoring the guard who jumped to attention and reached for the handle, the Regent pulled open the door himself and continued lurching along through the gloom—ignoring other guards and passing through other doors, sometimes turning this way, sometimes turning that way, always humming tunelessly to himself and paying no mind whatsoever to
the whispered pleas and promises that issued from the fetid cells lining the corridors, or to the bony hands that poked through the tiny, barred windows to claw after him.

By and by, he arrived at his destination. He was about to order the guard to push open the heavy door when he heard the big Khan talking. It had been months since the wretch had done more than laugh like the insolent tribal dog he was—months in which he'd renewed his old game of toying with Mordecai and Murdock. Of smiling knowingly when they asked for the ten thousandth time what Balthazar had told him of the healing Pool of Genezing back when the two had been friends enjoying the hospitality of the ill-fated old King Malthusius.

Now, Mordecai stood very still and listened to him speak.

“ … How about you just tell me your name, then,” he suggested in a voice ragged from disuse.

No answer.

“Come now, lad,” he said gruffly. “By my reckoning we've been roommates for somewhere between a day and three. You can't
still
be frightened of me. Is it my hair? Is that what's bothering you? Shall I smooth it down for you?”

Upon hearing the rattle of chains followed by a grunt of apparent satisfaction, Mordecai scowled impatiently. As a race, the dirty, smelly Khan placed no stock whatsoever in personal hygiene at the best of times; this particular fool had been shackled to the wall for years, wallowing in his own filth, unable to pick his nose, let alone tend to the matted mess he called hair. What on earth was he doing?

Mordecai heard a faint noise. Then, softly: “My name is Mateo.”

“Pleased to meet you, Mateo,” grunted the big Khan. “My name is Barka. I am a Prince of the Khan. Do you know who the Khan are?”

No answer.

“We are a great warrior people who live high upon the snowy mountains with our wonderful woolly sheep,” explained Barka proudly. “I suppose you're a Gypsy?”

No answer.

“I tell you, Mateo, I once had a good friend who was a Gypsy. Name of Balthazar—he was your very own ambassador to Parthania back before it all went bad. Kind of a big-headed imbecile, if you don't mind me saying— going on as he did about healing waters. Mind you, he died as brave a death as any man I've ever known, and you must always remember that there is great honour in dying well, Mateo.
Great
honour,” said Barka, his voice thickening. He paused for a moment, then cleared his throat and cheerfully said, “Would you tell me a story, Mateo?”

To Mordecai's utter amazement, the caged Gypsy brat actually
laughed
. “You're the grownup,” he said in his chalksoft voice. “You're supposed to tell
me
a story.”

“What!” exclaimed the Khan. “Who says? I've never heard—”

Irritated by the useless turn the conversation had taken, Mordecai ordered the guard to push open the door so that he could step into the stifling room. At the sight of him, the Khan and the child fell silent. The Gorgishman in the hanging cage hissed loudly and bared his crowded teeth.
Wordlessly, Mordecai considered his options. He had intended to work on the child tonight, but now he wasn't so sure. After all, although the blood of young Gypsies had marvellous rejuvenating properties, he'd more or less concluded that no matter what the formulation, it simply lacked the power to heal his terrible deformities. As he'd told Murdock, he'd come to believe that finding the Pool of Genezing was his only real hope. And as the Khan Barka had so helpfully pointed out, he'd been Balthazar's good friend. If he was in a talkative mood, there was always the chance that, with proper encouragement, he'd finally let something useful slip.

The Gypsy could wait.

Decision made, Mordecai shuffled over to the neatly arranged table of implements and picked up a small pair of pliers. His heavy, bobbing head filled with exciting thoughts of how Lady Bothwell would lust after him if his body were as beautiful as his face, he lurched across the room to stand in front of the Khan Barka. “Tell me what you know of the location of the Pool of Genezing,” he ordered.

For a moment, the big tribesman said nothing. Then he began to laugh derisively.

Nodding placidly, Mordecai lifted the pliers and went to work.

THIRTY-THREE

“
I
WOULD NOT LIVE the life of a king for all the diamonds in the Mines of Torodania,” announced Azriel the next morning, as he stood with his hands on his hips watching Persephone excitedly adjust her plumed hat in anticipation of the arrival of the king, who'd sent word shortly after first light that he wished to spend the day with her.