A Princess of the Chameln (21 page)

Ross of Eildon was more sparing of his presence than the Varda princes; he lived in the south wing of Kerrick Hall and kept his own people closely about him. Yet Aidris had seen him riding in procession or passing from one room to another in the evening with musicians and flamboys. He seemed to her a being so strange that he might have come from a land of legend, from Ystamar or from the kingdom under the waves. He was of great physical beauty, tall and straight, golden-haired and nobly bearded. Aidris felt sure that he never raised his voice, never moved quickly. His aura was so strong for her that she wondered how anyone could come into his presence without being aware of it. The air about him burned, gold or pearl-colored. She remembered her childish fancy, riding to meet the northern tribes: how the fair-skinned people of the Zor had shining faces. But their radiance had to do with health and the open air.

Once, during a turn off duty, she tried to find her way to Sabeth, to greet her after so long and to ask about Eildon. A new waiting woman took in her name to the chambers where the young couple were lodged. She waited in the corridor, with strange courtiers and servants passing, for a long time, and then Moss appeared, the former page, now grown into Gerr of Kerrick's manservant. He had the grace to look embarrassed.

“Oh, Venn,” he said. “We thought it might be you.”

“I sent in my name,” she said, foreseeing all and not prepared to let him down lightly.

“Therza couldn't understand your accent,” he said, “but she gave a description. Not many kedran come hanging about in the hall without any duty.”

“Moss, what is the matter? Is the Lady Sabeth resting? Was my name brought to her?”

“When the royal visit is over,” he said, “Sir Gerr and Lady Sabeth will have their days for petitions as Lord Huw and Lady Aumerl do now.”

“I did not come as a petitioner but as a friend,” she said.

“Venn, go along. It is the way of the world. Her estate has changed.”

“Do you remember if a gift of silk arrived from Varda?”

“From the envoy, you mean? Yes, Nenad Am Charn sent a gift. The Lady Sabeth is a high-born exile from the Chameln lands, after all.”

“The gift was from me and my family,” she said, “and Nenad Am Charn would have seen to it that the gift was so delivered.”

She turned away, but Moss came after her.

“Venn, please . . . be a good fellow,” he said with a hint of his old whining tone. “There's a chance, a good chance, that they will be given something by the Prince of Eildon. I mean an estate, a title. They have to be discreet.”

“Tell the Lady Sabeth I was disappointed,” she said.

She went down the stairs feeling more puzzled than anything else. Could Sabeth have had her head turned so completely? She found herself thinking of things so petty and ignoble that she was ashamed. She wondered about the winter cloak of lynx and fox, Bajan's gift, which hung in Sabeth's wardrobe still because Aidris had no room for it in her small press in the barracks. She felt envious of Prince Ross because he had stolen away one of her wish-dreams.
He
would raise Sabeth and Gerr to a high estate. She sighed at her own foolishness: here she was a grown woman, a kedran of four years service, still indulging in the fantasies of a royal child.

She was cast down a little and seemed to drag herself through the toils of extra duty. Then, as the long moon came to an end, there was Fantjoy, curled and perfumed, at the barracks with an invitation, a royal summons, in fact, for Kedran Venn. He had already ch-checked with Captain Brock.

“Be damned, Venn,” said Ortwen. “You must go! You cannot feign sick.”

“I
am
sick.”

“You're healthy as a horse. You can wear your best New Year tunic. . . .”

Her Chameln finery was admired by the kedran, who hated to wear skirts. She allowed herself to be coaxed into her good white, the fine doeskin breeches and the long tunic trimmed with bead-work, fresh as they were on the day the Lady Maren laid them in her saddlebag for the flight into Athron. But she waited until the last possible moment, and then slipped in through the kitchens.

The cavernous rooms were full of steam; the cooks and scullions ran and shouted and pummelled each other, purple with effort. There seemed to be twenty formal dinners being prepared besides a dozen cauldrons of simpler fare. She did not have far to go: a large plain room on this ground floor with doors to the north courtyard. It was named Hot Commons—it was so near the kitchen that food brought in had no time to get cold—and it had been chosen for the Varda Benefit.

The visitors from the city repaid hospitality and good service with a feast. There, milling in the corridor in their best clothes, were servants of high rank, soldiers and officers, waiting-women. The doors were flung open, and Prince Flor's majordomo began checking invitations and bawling out the names of the guests.

A hush fell over the company as they went in. As Aidris came up to the door behind a stately old woman in black silk, who turned out to be the mother of the head gardener, she saw that Hot Commons had been transformed. The plain room had been swathed and panelled in russet and gold cloth; gilded stags' heads for the house of Menvir supported swags of maple, golden ash and dark pine. Copper candle-racks blazed overhead, and an early fire had been lit.

Rushes had been spread among the short trestles, trophies of the chase hung upon the walls; and to complete the illusion of a hunting lodge, Prince Flor and Princess Josenna sat with their closest followers in a rustic bower beside the fireplace. The Varda musicians had begun to play. The majordomo, after his deafening roar of “Kedran Venn,” gave her a sly, approving smile, and a little page led her to a certain table under a canopy of green netting.

“Venn!” cried Genufa, the dark-haired waiting woman, glowing like a jewel.

“At last a familiar face,” she whispered. “Truly, Aidris, there is something afoot. I feel like a masker in a pageant who has not been given her place in the parade.”

“Something afoot?”

“Look about you . . .”

Their table with its gilded pinecones and peacock feathers was filling up now with eight, nine, a dozen young women. Aidris had already looked about for Fantjoy or Prince Terril, but they were nowhere to be seen.

“Holy Tree,” drawled a red-haired beauty in the accents of Eildon, “are we to be the willow-sisters then, parted from the company of men to weep for the cares of the world?”

“Take some wine,” said a kedran with a falcon on her tunic, “you'll weep sooner.”

The first courses of the banquet were streaming into Hot Commons with hautboys, torches and gusts of savory fragrance. A number of the greatest delicacies—the roast swan with its golden crown, a great pasty of larks and pigeons, an aspic in the shape of a green rose—came to the girls' table.

“Alas,” said the lady on Aidris's right hand, “I believe, dear sisters, that we are being fattened up.”

Aidris ate brook trout—swan having unfortunate associations for her—and studied this lady. She knew that she had seen her before, but only a hint of the time and place remained. Sunlight after rain, horses, a feeling of sharp nostalgia. Was it autumn weather?

“You have that beautiful beaded tunic from the Chameln lands,” said the lady, picking daintily at a pigeon leg.

“From my homeland,” said Aidris, smiling.

The lady was somewhat older than herself and dressed in the style of Athron. She had a fall of dark brown hair and a skin lightly tanned as if from riding.

“Oh what a happy chance,” cried the lady. Aidris had seen that the name upon her rustic place marker was Mistress Quade. “We were there upon our travels. I must present you to my dear liege. That is, if your partner will permit it.”

“My partner?”

“What?” Mistress Quade smiled. “Do you not know, then, who will partner you? Look about you: we are birds in a cage waiting to be set free!”

Across the crescent shaped table a blonde maiden cried out, “There will be dancing in the removes!”

“Good Mistress Quade,” said Aidris, still unable to place the lady, “how fares the Chameln land? How long since you returned?”

“More than three years,” said Mistress Quade, rinsing her fingers. “How quickly the time goes. We were there before and after the Protector came to power.”

“Do you mean Werris?” asked Aidris as lightly as she could. “I would call him some other names.”

“Oh forgive me,” said Mistress Quade. “You are a loyalist, of course.”

They were interrupted by a group of musicians and the majordomo who came to their table with a basket of favors. The other guests cheered and whistled as a serenade was played and packages cunningly wrapped in leaves or woven straw were given out.

Aidris found that her favor was a silver owl's head with green eyes; Genufa had a pomander of silver-gilt; Mistress Quade a little mirror in a bronze case. When Aidris looked into it, she saw a stranger with wide green eyes and red lips, a flush in her pale cheeks, dark hair that curled more softly in the air of Athron: a girl, she was pleased to admit, who did not look out of place at this table with the rest of the cage-birds.

“What news was there of the Daindru when you were in the Chameln lands?” she asked Mistress Quade.

“Ah my dear,” she said, “you have heard the rumors. A history of blood. The kings both murdered, and their children imprisoned. We travelled first to Achamar, that lovely city at the end of the world, then crossed into Lien, through the Adderneck Pass, by Nesbath, at the head of the inland sea. We spent more than a year in Lien. We were not long in Balufir, it was not suited to our mood at the time; but we did see a Tournament of Song, as it was called, in an old fortress on the Ringist. We made a leisurely voyage to Eildon and its islands, and then our way led through the Chyrian lands of Mel'Nir. We climbed the High Plateau—I will never forget it—and searched for the Ruined City, the one that wanders in the mist.”

Mistress Quade's voice trembled, she set down her goblet of wine.

“Did you find it?” prompted Aidris gently.

“No!” exclaimed Mistress Quade. “No, it eluded us. It was a very adventurous time for us both. We returned a different way. We crossed Lien in the west and travelled through the Adz and came into the Chameln lands not long after Werris had secured the passes. You were asking about the poor children—they were searching for one of them, the Princess of the Firn, at this time. We had come through the forest looking for the goblin folk. We were tired but kept up our spirits. We came to Aldero, a tiny place. . . .”

“Aldero,” said Aidris, taking a gulp of wine herself. “Aldero, the forest village.”

“And then to Vigrund, a charming town, with a good inn. The place was full of the giant soldiers, there was no hope of getting over the Rodfell Pass, it was shut tight. We went back to the east, stayed in Zerrah . . . do you know Zerrah?. . . for a long time, three more moons, simply resting.”

“And the children?”

“Yes, it is a horrid story. There will be pretenders to the thrones, I am sure of it. The royal children had not been seen in Achamar for years. The hue and cry at the border came to nothing. The young lad was drowned crossing the Danmar, that is certain. And the girl . . . I cannot recall if she was older or younger . . .”

“Older,” said Aidris, “several years older.”

“We heard it from the new head of the garrison at Zerrah Manor. The Princess was murdered at Thuven, a wretched old country house on the way to Vigrund. We rode home that way, having obtained our safe-conduct. We saw the very place where she is supposed to be buried, a barrow, an old grave-hill behind the ruins of the house. And the most touching thing of all was that some loyalist had planted an oak on her grave . . . it was already flourishing, almost a sapling.”

“Thuven Manor House is destroyed then?”

“Burnt and razed. A place accursed. It made us shudder. The old man, mad I do not doubt, and with a wife as wicked as himself . . . Old Nazran was shut up in Ledler Fortress.” “Nazran Am Thuven is not a murderer!” “My dear, you are young. You do not know evil and misfortune . . .”

Mistress Quade pressed Aidris's hand, and her dark eyes were full of tears. Aidris breathed deeply; she felt divided from herself as she had done in the old mill. She might soar up to the brass candle holders in the ceiling of Hot Commons and look down upon the table of girls, bright-faced and dressed in fine clothes, and see herself among them. The lying, foolish tale she had just heard touched her deeply, made her afraid and angry, and at the same time it did not touch her at all. It was a party jest, to be forgotten by morning. Yet Nazran and his lady were imprisoned and Thuven had been destroyed, that at least she believed.

She gave a start as hunting horns rang out. The doors to the north court flew open, and in came a company of young men in green and red hunting dress, all with plumed hats and gilded masks that entirely concealed their faces. They whooped and danced up and down the long room, teasing the diners, snatching tidbits from the platters, turning somersaults and scattering green marzipan “coins” stamped with a stag's head. A cry went up as they came down the room again:

“The birds! The birds under the net!”

The musicians struck up “Blackbird and Thrush,” played as a jig, and the huntsmen descended noisily upon the table of the birds. There was a great deal of shrieking and rustling as they claimed their partners. Aidris, at the back of the table in a quiet place, heard Mistress Quade murmur “You
are
a dark horse, Kedran Venn . . .” as she was led off by a tall masker. Then she herself was claimed by a nimble gentleman with chestnut curls under his huntsman's hat.

“Green-eyes . . .” said Prince Terril.

She took his hand, and they led off the dance. Terril was a strong and supple partner, and she understood a practical reason for his choosing her: she was the right height for him. They leaped and spun and tried difficult figures. The music played and played and carried them away with it. She saw that Fantjoy partnered Genufa, and the young men who visited Kerrick on feast days had chosen the visiting ladies from Eildon and Varda. She noticed that by the time the musicians played “Cock Pheasant in a Bush” Mistress Quade and her partner had turned aside and settled to rest.