The Invisible Hands - Part 1: Gambit (12 page)
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“Ah, Eynurm, come in,” Anaxantis said, putting the second of two
parchments he had been reading down.
“Your Highness,” Eynurm of Tarnwood nodded in greeting upon entering the war room.
“My Lord will do, Eynurm,” the prince said absentmindedly.
“Please, sit down.”
He looked again at the parchment, then inquisitively at his visitor.
Before him sat a young man with short, bristly brown hair and an open face that seemed incapable of hiding anything. His ears stood a bit out, but not so that it made him look ridiculous. He just seemed exceptionally attentive, as if he was constantly listening very closely to what you were saying to him. He had a general no-nonsense demeanor about him.
“I received a letter from your father,” he began.
“So did I, two weeks ago,” the page said. “I’m sorry, My Lord. I should have told you, but I was considering my options.”
Anaxantis looked at him with concern.
“Did you read it?” the page asked in an unhappy tone.
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“Yes, as far as I can make out, he is disinheriting and disowning
you for what he seems to think of as rebellion against his paternal authority and conduct unbecoming of a noble. He practically demands that I chase you away from here.”
“I’ll be gone by the end of the month, in a few days. Or sooner, immediately, if you want me to.”
Anaxantis looked again at the page.
“Do you mind if I ask what he means by unbecoming conduct?”
Eynurm looked at the prince defiantly.
“He objects to me having fallen in love,” he said.
“Ha.”
“With the daughter of a well-to-do saddler. She lives in Lorseth Market. So what if she’s not nobility? We’re barons, for crying out loud, not exactly royalty.”
“You’re not the first noble to have an affair with a commoner, nor will you be the last.”
“Oh, Father wouldn’t mind an affair. He does mind me wanting to marry her. I wrote him we were engaged.”
“I see. Ambitious fathers can be a pain in the, eh, neck,” Anaxantis commiserated.
“I have three younger brothers, so it’s not as if he needs me to continue the House of Tarnwood. That made his decision all the easier, I suppose. Anyway, I’ll be out of your hair soon.”
“Where were you planning to go? To your future in-laws maybe?”
Eynurm grinned lopsided.
“Not likely. She dumped me as soon as I told her Father had disinherited me. She’s seeing a rich merchant’s son now.”
“I’m so sorry,” Anaxantis said, for want of more substantial help.
“Well, maybe the old man was right after all. Whatever. My allowance won’t be coming next month. I must look for a place to stay, since I’m not welcome anymore in what used to be my home.”
Just for one moment Anaxantis thought Eynurm might cry.
“I have no money of my own. I suppose I’ll need work. It’s not how I pictured my future,” the page said miserably.
At that moment the door opened and Arranulf and Obyann entered.
“You’re taking the curly one,” Obyann said. “He gets on my nerves.”
“Everybody and everything gets on your nerves, Ramaldah,“ Arranulf replied philosophically.
“Yeah, well—”
“Come in, guys, no need whatsoever to knock as civilized people would do. You’re at home, after all,” Anaxantis interrupted them in a biting tone.
“Oh, yes, sorry, Anaxantis,” the young duke of Landemere said.
Then he saw Eynurm. “I mean, My Lord,” he corrected himself.
Anaxantis looked imploringly at the ceiling.
Eynurm nodded at the two new arrivals.
“Your Graces,” he said.
“It’s us, Tarnwood,” Obyann said. “Remember us?”
“Of course, but I thought, since you’ve been knighted you’re no longer pages, and propriety—”
“Nobody cares about all that, Tarnwood. Nobody cares,” Obyann said offhandedly.
Arranulf smiled at Eynurm. Anaxantis looked questioningly at him.
“Do you mind?” he asked.
“It will be all over the pages’ barracks soon enough,” Eynurm shrugged.
Anaxantis explained the situation.
“Major bummer, Tarnwood,” Obyann said after the prince had told them. “Maybe the soup won’t be eaten as hot as it is served.”
Eynurm gave him a confused look.
“It’s something they say in Ramaldah,” Arranulf explained. “It means—”
“He knows what it means, Landemere,” Obyann snarled. “Anyway, what kind of father does that to his child? To his son, no less?”
“Mine, apparently,” Eynurm said despondently.
Obyann snorted with contempt.
“So, you have nowhere to go, no special obligations and you need gainful employment?” Arranulf said pensively. “As it happens, Obyann and I were discussing that being masters of pages is too much of a job for just the two of us. There are over a hundred forty by now, you know?”
Obyann looked at him indignantly.
“We discussed nothing of the kind, Landemere,” he fumed. “Have your weak, degenerate brains turned completely into porridge? We can manage just fine. Certainly with four head pages instead of two, although the little ones will prove to be completely useless at best and a hindrance more likely, but so, what else is new?”
Arranulf coughed discreetly.
“Think again, Ramaldah. Weren’t we saying, just before we came
in, how we could use a third master of pages? To help us? Surely you remember how worried we were that Anaxantis would refuse us, since master of pages is a paid office, that comes with lodgings at the castle?”
Obyann suddenly understood.
“Ah, yes, I seem to remember us tossing a few ideas like that around.”
“Gentlemen,” Anaxantis intervened. “Have I understood what you’re saying? Only a few days ago I knighted you, appointed you joint masters of pages, you still have to move into your new quarters, and you’re already extorting me?”
“Oh, extortion is such an ugly word,” Arranulf said.
“Maybe, and also a fitting one. Anyway, how do I know he’s up to the job?”
Arranulf looked at Obyann who looked at Anaxantis.
“I know, I know,” he erupted. “Remember the Zinchara?”
“Vaguely,” Anaxantis said dryly. “Yes, I’m almost certain I was in the neighborhood when some fighting was going on there.”
“Exactly,” Obyann continued, ignoring the obvious sarcasm. “We were first on the battlefield. Well, we couldn’t have done it without Tarnwood. He was one of the patrol leaders, you see.”
Anaxantis looked doubtful.
“The pages respect him and look up to him,” Arranulf smiled.
“Come on, Anaxantis, it’s only one extra clansman. Surely it doesn’t make that much of a difference.”
“To my hide it will, seeing as Tomar will have it,” the prince said.
“He’s already complaining I spend far too much money. And now you
want me to appoint Eynurm master of pages, which means I’ll have to
knight him before his age, and also that I have to enlist him in the clan and pay him.”
Arranulf and Obyann didn’t answer. Seeing their befuddled faces, Anaxantis laughed.
“I must admit, it seems the perfect solution. That is if Eynurm agrees to all this.”
He cast a questioning look at the page, who couldn’t believe what he had just heard.
“Yes, yes, of course. I, I don’t know what to say,” Eynurm stammered.
“Yes and thank you both come to mind,” Arranulf said.
“Be careful what you’re getting yourself into though, Tarnwood.
Except for me you’ll be the only other normal guy. The rest of them are all perverts and completely bonkers,” Obyann added.
“Oh, let’s get this over with,” Anaxantis said. “I think I’d better begin with knighting you.” He looked around. “I seem to have mislaid my sword.”
He turned to Eynurm.
“What… what do I do? Kneel?”
“Oh, in heaven’s name, no,” the prince said. “My Lords of Ramaldah and Landemere will officiate as witnesses.” He laid his hand on Tarnwood’s right shoulder. “And thus you are a knight, Sir Eynurm. Be good and, eh, things. I’ll have the parchments made up and registered. I understand Arranulf and Obyann have yet to move into their new quarters, so you can do that together.”
“Thank you, Your Highness,” the new knight said, overwhelmed by the sudden good turn his fortunes had taken. “And you too, guys.
Thanks for standing up for me.”
“Don’t forget to thank Lorcko when you see him,” Anaxantis added
casually. “It was he who made me decide to help you out. Although neither he nor I could have known that at the time.”
“Iramid?”
“Yes. He told me how you went out of your way to befriend him, just when he needed a friend the most.”
“Ah, that. It was nothing.”
“He seems to think it was definitely something. So do I. Lorcko says you didn’t even particularly like him at the time. Yet you invited him into your circle of friends.”
“It’s just that I can’t bear the cruelty of those snobs. They were putting him down in the most vicious way and I wasn’t about to let them get away with it.”
“I hate bullies,” Obyann grumbled.
“Funny thing is,” Eynurm continued, “that I did it partly because I had seen how he himself defended one of his Mukthar friends. It changed how I looked at him. Till then I thought he was just some empty headed, pretty-boy parvenu. I was wrong. So, when he in his turn could use someone to stand by him, I thought it could as well be me.”
“That was kind of you. Not to mention that it shows a lot of character, correcting your initial impression of him. I could use a friend like that myself,” Anaxantis smiled. “Oh yes, before I forget,” he said, addressing the three of them, “I plan to have some leisurely festivities for the Midwinter period. Mainly eating, drinking, riding, walking and talking. Just between friends. You’re invited, the three of you, to Landemere Castle.”
Arranulf raised his eyebrows.
“Seriously? You’re inviting me to my own castle?”
“No, I’m not. I’m inviting you to my end-of-the-year revels, which I
happen to hold at Landemere Castle.”
“You are the regent, I suppose,” Arranulf shrugged, his smile betraying he didn’t care.
“Yes, I am,” the prince said. “I have my reasons for choosing that particular place.”
He turned to Eynurm.
“Masters of pages are entitled to a page of their own.”
“Landemere takes the curly one,” Obyann said quickly. “We discussed it.”
“No, Ramaldah, you just ordered me to take Ryhunzo.”
“Yeah, well, I told you he gets on my nerves. And we can hardly leave them on their own in our old barrack.”
He shuddered.
“Terrible, terrible things would happen.”
“You’re exaggerating. They’re quite innocent boys,” Arranulf replied calmly.
“Yes, Landemere, you simpleton, and how long do you think it would take for those creeps at the bullies’ barrack to figure out those innocent little sodomites are on their own? Without anybody to defend them? You’re taking the curly one, I take the depressing one and Tarnwood can choose who he likes.”
He crossed his arms.
Anaxantis wasn’t paying attention anymore. He was rifling through the parchments on the table, looking pensively at one of them.
“Guys, move into your new quarters in the castle, and make a list
for my consideration with your candidates for the open posts of head pages and patrol leaders,” he mumbled absentmindedly.
Eynurm was leaving the war room last.
“What are you going to tell my father?” he asked, before parting.
Anaxantis, distracted, looked up.
“Your father? Nothing. Why would I tell him anything? I’m not his personal secretary, as far as I know. Neither do I see any need to make the content of his letter to me public.”
Eynurm let out a relieved sigh.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” he said, and made to leave the room.
“For everything.”
“Eynurm,” the prince said, still looking at his parchments, “my friends call me Anaxantis.”
“Yes, in private we do. When there's other people around it’s My Lord. He doesn’t like being called Your Highness,” Obyann said while they were walking out of the main gate.
Soon Eynurm had to leave them to go fetch his things from his own barrack, while Arranulf and Obyann went to theirs.
“I’ll probably have to leave a week early for those end-of-the-year revels of Anaxantis,” Obyann mused, when it was just the two of them.
“How so?” Arranulf asked.
“I have to prepare my marriage to Ninda, don’t I? There’s a lot to arrange.”
“Have you even asked her father for her hand yet?”
“Yes, I asked Grindo last time I went to visit there. He seemed actually surprised that anybody would ask his permission for anything.
You can see it is time to get things moving.”
“You’re both young,” Arranulf said.
“Yeah, well, time stops for nobody, Landemere, and I’m on a schedule. I want young Obyann to be born this month next year. Legit— imately born in incontrovertible, duly witnessed wedlock. Babies born in the fall grow up to be strong and sturdy. And then we’ll have to begin thinking about young Eckfred, won’t we?”
Arranulf whistled.
“I see you’ve got it all planned out.”
“Of course I have, Landemere. By the way, have you done anything about your, eh, thing.”
“My thing?”
“You know what I mean, Landemere. You and Hemarchidas.
Anything cooking?”
“He barely knows I exist. As long as he stays near Anaxantis that will remain so, I suspect. Even if he doesn’t—”
“Have you done anything about it?” Obyann interrupted him, irritated.
“Like what, Obyann?” Arranulf responded, equally annoyed.
“How would I know, Landemere? I know nothing about how you deviants handle these things. Do you bring each other flowers? I bring Ninda flowers, oh, and sweets, lots of sweets, because she likes them.
Does Hemarchidas like sweets?”
Arranulf smiled, sadly.
“No, Obyann, we don’t bring each other flowers. Nor sweets. And I haven’t a clue what I should do. If only I could have him to myself for a 10
few months, weeks, a few days even. We could get to know each other,
and maybe he wouldn’t be that obsessed with the prince anymore.”