A Posse of Princesses (15 page)

She got dressed. Paused at Shera’s door,
hesitated, then knocked very softly.

No answer.

Remembering the tears of the night before,
she tiptoed away and wandered down through the palace—which seemed
rather empty. Surely Shera had not suffered the same
disappointment? Rhis shook her head. Shera had talked about Lios
jokingly, not longingly. No, it couldn’t be Lios.

Glaen?

She remembered that look on Glaen’s face. And
Shera’s tears. What about Rastian, back home in Gensam—he of the
eight months and seventeen days?

The sounds of voices and the occasional clash
and clang of steel broke into Rhis’s circle of unanswerable
questions. She wandered down a hall she’d never explored, until she
found a big room with a bank of east windows letting in morning
light.

In the middle of the room several pairs,
mostly boys but some girls, were busy sword fighting. Others
gathered around, watching. One of these was a familiar
figure—medium height for a fellow, compact build, well-defined
shoulders, long brown hair neatly tied back: Dandiar.

He stood with two other scribes who were
holding papers. Dandiar stood with his hands clasped behind him as
he talked low-voiced with the other two.

Rhis headed that way.

Now the voices were clearer.

“ . . . and the invitations ought to go out
before nightfall, because there seems to be another storm due
in.”

“Any more bridges down?” the female scribe
asked.

“Two,” Dandiar said, waving a hand. “We’ve
sent—ho!
Nic
e defense, there, Tam. Laernad, keep that blade
up, or you’re going to have them coming at your neck every
time.”

On Dandiar’s other side, one of the boys Rhis
didn’t know added, “Try using your back foot, Tam.”

Out on the floor, two of those heirs to
powerful Vesarjan duchies flicked up swords in acknowledgement.

Rhis’s gaze went to Dandiar’s hands. She’d
never noticed before, but the visible palm was callused. She
remembered the way his arms shaped the fine velvet robe he’d worn
the night of the masquerade. So Lios made his scribes learn to
fight? The other two scribes, one male, one female, still clutching
their piles of papers, watched the practice. Did the girl also do
sword fighting?

Dandiar spotted Rhis. “You’re up betimes,” he
said with a welcoming smile.

“As are the rest of you,” Rhis said.

A sudden, loud clash and a “Hah!” brought
everyone’s attention to the far end, where Jarvas, with a slight
smile on his long, hard face, stood with his sword point resting
lightly before one booted foot, other hand on his hip. His
partner—one of the bigger, more brawny ducal heirs—wrung his hand
as he stooped to pick up his dropped sword.

“Plays for keeps, looks like,” one of the
scribes observed.

Dandiar shrugged one shoulder, his brows
slightly up. “Well, we can finish our discussion after the
immediate duties are done,” he said.

The girl scribe waved her papers, the boy
sketched a wry salute, and they departed.

“Doesn’t Lios let you people sleep?” Rhis
asked. “At least you and your fellow male scribes. I noticed you
were all on duty last night.”

“Part of the job,” Dandiar said. Then he
grinned. “But we get to live in a palace, so there are advantages
as well as drawbacks.”

“The same could be said for princes and
princesses,” Rhis joked.

Once again Dandiar’s brows soared. Rhis had
never really noticed, but his light brown eyebrows were very
expressive above his wide-set eyes. Of course with that snub nose
and the broad forehead that made his face seem round, he wasn’t
handsome in the manner of Lios, but neither was he ugly. He was, if
you had to say anything,
interesting
.

“Problem?”

His voice broke her thoughts.

Rhis realized she’d been staring, and her
face heated up. “No,” she said, looking down at her toes. “Lack of
sleep. I’m awake, but my mind isn’t. It still seems to think it’s
upstairs, under the quilt, asleep.”

“Well, that state could describe most of us,”
Dandiar admitted. “I had to rewrite a letter three times this
morning, just for stupid errors.”

“You ought not to be working at all,” she
said, without thinking.

“Ready to take over the care and feeding of
Lios’s scribes?”

In other words, she thought, was she ready to
marry Lios and take over his palace?

This time her face went fiery red, and she
winced.

“Beg pardon,” Dandiar said. “My attempts at
jokes are about as clumsy as my letter-writing today.”

“Well, if you were twitting me for sighing
over Lios, I suppose I deserved it.”

“You didn’t deserve any hurt. I’m the one who
deserves a sting,” he retorted, looking at her with that narrow,
searching gaze she’d seen once or twice before.

She looked away, her skin tingling as if
butterflies made of flame scorched her with their wings.

“Your costume was well-chosen,” he added.
“Did I tell you that? I meant to. You looked good in it.”

Well-chosen. Not the words of court flattery,
perhaps, but they felt the more real for all that. Again she
tingled, like she was made of light. She said, “So did you. In
yours.” And blushed, turning away to watch the toiling fencers.
Most of them seemed tired, and red-faced, all except Jarvas, whose
blade flashed and clanged with practiced speed and strength.

“Was your dance with Lios disappointing?” he
asked. “I noticed that you didn’t finish it—unlike all the
others.”

“It was fine,” Rhis said, and forced a smile.
“He was hot and thirsty. Anyone could see it. And I don’t blame
him. I mean, to him, I’m just another girl here.” She hadn’t meant
to, but somehow she couldn’t keep herself from rushing on. “If I
were to make any guesses, Iardith is the one—and she’ll look just
splendid, gracing that ballroom, and all the other rooms, too,” she
added, trying to be fair.

“There’s a great deal more to being a queen
than looking ornamental,” Dandiar commented. He clasped his hands
behind him again and rocked back on his heels and then forward. “So
Lios has been pursuing her? Or is it the other way around?”

Rhis opened her mouth to say that Lios seemed
to be pursuing her, but then she thought back. Every time she had
seen them together, it was usually after Iardith had walked up and
calmly taken her place next to him as if it was her right.

“Do people always defer to her? I mean, is it
Iardith, or does that happen with everybody who is really
gorgeous?” she asked, not seeing Dandiar any more, but Iardith’s
cool confidence, her seemingly unshakable conviction that she and
she alone belonged at Lios’s side.

Then she realized she was wit-wandering
again, and shook her head. Blinked. Looked at Dandiar, to discover
an unreadable expression.

“What do you think?” he asked.

“Lios doesn’t pursue anyone. Not that I’ve
seen, anyway. But then I’ve only seen him across rooms, and spoken
to him once,” she said. “He seems good-natured, and talks to
whoever talks to him. Iardith is the pursuer, but,” she added, “he
hasn’t exactly hinted her away, so I suspect that everyone else has
assumed that he wants her beside him.”

“How do you know that he hasn’t tried
hinting, but that she won’t take no for an answer?” Dandiar
replied.

Rhis remembered the gossip the horse-mad
cousins had dropped about the King of Arpalon, and she grimaced.
“Maybe she can’t take no for an answer,” she said. “Just as well I
am no longer sighing!”

“Are you really glad? Would you like more
time with Lios?”

People wandered around them to the sword rack
to choose more weapons, and began new bouts, or commented on old.
No one paid them the least heed. They were alone in the middle of a
crowded room.

Alone to Rhis, too, who looked around without
really seeing the combatants, or the observers. Was Dandiar
serious? Of course she had seen that he had a special place with
the new crown prince of Vesarja—and maybe he had enough influence
to get her a private interview.

Did she want one?

“Not really,” Rhis said. And then, quickly,
“He’s very nice, and I do appreciate this wonderful party. We have
nothing like this palace, or these kinds of gatherings in Nym, and
I’ll remember it all my life—”

Dandiar waved a hand in a quick circle, and
Rhis knew her compliments sounded more like excuses—both equally
empty. She grinned, feeling foolish. “You
know
what I
mean.”

Dandiar bowed. “Could you doubt it, Your
Highness?” He grinned, a strange sort of grin. “You’ve probably
observed that he does talk to me. Rather a lot. You did make an
impression. This morning he told me that five girls tried to get
him alone in a cozy nook on one of the unlit balconies, three
proposed to him, offering things their parents had coached them to
offer as alliance bribes. One wanted to get him drinking wine, who
knows why. And one—Taniva—commented that he moved as if his boots
pinched. But only one asked him if he was thirsty, and he tried to
make me guess, but I knew it had to be you.”

“That’s me, short on romance, but long on
being practical,” Rhis said, feeling an urge to giggle. Her
emotions were going unsteady again, and she shook her head. “And
it’s not even my duty! Oh, I don’t know what I mean. I think I need
breakfast.”

“Well, I know what I need, and that’s to get
to work.” He executed a practiced bow, and then walked rapidly
away.

Rhis stayed where she was, feeling oddly
bereft. She liked talking to Dandiar. He was so easy to talk to—and
everyone else thought so, too.

Except Iardith, because she didn’t talk to
scribes.

Rhis watched Jarvas tirelessly dispose of
three partners before she realized that she hadn’t seen how he did
it, nor could she name the last combatant. Her mind kept twittering
around in circles, just like the birds outside her window, except
there was no food, no baby birds to benefit, just questions and
more questions.

So she went in search of breakfast. There she
found many of her friends, most looking as groggy as she felt. Vors
was not there, she was relieved to see. Neither were Shera—or
Glaen.

Carithe said, fighting a yawn, “There you
are, Rhis! I wonder if Shera will wake up at all today. I have a
suggestion. Let’s begin rehearsals tomorrow. I’m too tired
today.”

“I am, too,” Rhis said. “I don’t even want to
think about entertaining. I just want to sit.”

“And let people entertain us,” Moret said.
“Well, I’ve got some good news, as it happens. Just heard as I was
coming downstairs. The singers have at last arrived, and their
concert will be tonight.”

Various people expressed pleasure—though not
with any conviction. They all sounded too tired. Rhis decided she
only had to stay awake until the concert was over, and then she
could go early to sleep. If they arranged dancing that night, she
was going to skip it.

Shera appeared not long after. “Oh, there you
are. I must have slept too long,” she said in a bright voice, but
her eyes were pink around the rims, and her nose suspiciously pink
as well.

So they sat in the dining room talking about
the masquerade. The talk quickly devolved into a guessing game
about who had come as what famous person in history—and who had
been the other half of their love story. Shera distracted Rhis with
her frequent giggles, and the restless way she kept looking up at
everyone who entered or left.

Rhis listened with scattered attention.
Ordinarily she liked this kind of talk, but her wandering wits kept
pursuing stray memories of the night before, and when she found her
eyes closing once, she decided to get up and take that walk she’d
promised herself.

No one else wanted to get up. They were all
too tired.

“Are you crazy, Rhis?” Carithe asked.

“It’s sunny.” Rhis pointed at the windows.
Somehow the sun had already slipped west. Her mind persisted in
thinking the time late morning, but it was actually late afternoon.
“We in Nym don’t ever waste a sunny day, as it might be six months
before we get another.”

The others all laughed, and she exited on
that happy sound.

Out in the garden, she realized that ‘sunny’
might have been the real joke, and not her six months. Though there
had been blue visible in the sky, most of the rest of it was fast
covering with clouds.

A coldish breeze kicked up, sending all the
blossoms nodding and bowing, just like the guests at a masquerade,
she thought hazily, as she wandered down a path. Occasional big
splatters of rain smacked her face and the backs of her hands, but
they felt good. The fresh air and the cool drops woke her up. She
began to walk more briskly.

A good walk was exactly what she needed. And
so she turned off the path and crossed a long grassy field toward
the trees that bordered the lake. She’d go and watch the raindrops
falling on the water. She loved seeing the sky reflected in the
lake, and the wind-ruffled water, and long-necked birds gliding
over the surface, wings just touching and sending rings rippling
outward.

Maybe she could try to write a ballad about
that, she thought as she started down the gentle slope toward the
lakeside; her fingers twitched. She hadn’t touched a tiranthe for
days and days. Well, soon enough she’d be leaving, and she’d have
plenty of time to play.

Lush trees formed green canopies overhead,
warding the rain; the pleasant smell of wet grass and trees and
ferns made her breathe deeply.

She began to round a bank of ferns, faltering
when she heard voices.

Voices? Here?

She put out a hand and thrust aside a ferny
branch. Two figures sat on a flat rock just above the plashing lake
water. Two heads close together, one brown, the other golden.