Champion of the Rose - Kobo Ebook (17 page)

"Behind the throne?" He stopped spreading preserves, teeth bared
in a satirical grin. "Old Domina
had a sense of humour. Can we get to it
without a battering ram?"

"There's a door of sorts in the treasury," Soren
said, doubtfully feeling her way around the walls. "Very concealed."

Strake finished off a pancake in three neat bites and
selected a peach from the tray. "We'll take a look after breakfast." He checked off a few points on their schedule
that day, then ate in silence, shifting his chair so he could continue to gaze
out at the garden. Soren watched him
without looking at him, just as she divided a fraction of her attention between
different members of the Court. Jansette
was now engaged in a teasing conversation with a young man who went bright red
at every second thing she said. Lord
Aristide had returned to his rooms and begun the ritual of either meditation or
incantation he had undertaken every morning of Soren's observation. Fors Cabtly and Aspen were having a solemn
discussion. Lady Rothwell, whom Soren
had not had a chance to speak to since her return, was crossing Fleeting Hall
with her daughter. She knocked on
Soren's door and spoke briefly to Halcean, but Soren didn't move, deciding to
find the time to meet later.

"Fors Cabtly asked me to make representations to you on
his behalf," she said, since Strake was spending more time staring at the
garden than eating. "And it is true
that he has performed the duties given him by the Regent perfectly well."

"You'd best not encourage people to treat you as a
conduit to my ear," Strake said, voice flat, but added: "Though
there's little you could do to stop them."

Soren just shrugged, and watched him frown at an unoffending
salt cellar.

"Cabtly occupies the rooms of the Councillor of
Mages," he continued, his tone suggesting that this was somehow Soren's
fault. "I've no objection to his
maintenance role – Sun knows the palace needs jobbing mages, and it seems like
Darest's stock of them has been whittled away to nothing – but he is not even a
shadow of a Councillor of Mages. That
posturing sprat apprenticed to him has more base ability, coupled with an impressive
lack of drive. I'm looking about for a
better choice."

Soren made no comment to this. He surveyed her lack of expression then
grimaced. "Other than the
obvious. The one the every second person
has tried to shove down my throat."

Precisely why he hadn't done it, Soren realised. Why no audience had been arranged with the
man who had been ruling Darest in all but name. Her Rathen did hate to be pushed. "I suspect it would be more...comfortable to work with Lord
Aristide than against him."

"I've seen enough of that one to know how 'comfortable'
I'd be if I strayed from whatever plans he's fomenting." He looked, of a sudden, sourly amused. "Especially if Fisk is correct in
telling me he hopes to marry his way to control of the throne."

"That could be said of most of the Court," Soren
observed neutrally. She hadn't realised
Strake's new secretary was passing on this variety of gossip.

"The man has every reason to wish me dead. Should I clutch a viper close to my
chest?"

Soren wasn't altogether sure if Strake wasn't arguing just
to be contrary, or if he'd been completely set against the Regent's son. "I met Lord Aristide earlier this
morning," she said, deciding that there would never be a safely
predictable opportunity to tell Strake he was going to be a father. Now that the Rose had made delaying the news
nearly impossible.

"Earlier? A dawn
rendezvous? Did he ask you to make
representations as well?"

"No. He knew the
meaning of the black rose and said the knowledge would inevitably spread
through Darest."

"Causing uncertainty and all manner of calumny no
doubt. Did he offer to show me a way to
avoid it?"

"Just made the observation."

"No solution?"

"He suggested calling on the Fair."

"You said he courted them, didn't you? Very eager to have the Fair back, and passing
messages through you won't get him anywhere."

"I'm not sure why he chose to. But I suppose he could just have been leading
up to – he did point out something on the Rose I didn't know was there. A bud."

For a moment Strake looked blank, then he lifted his
eyebrows. "Didn't know? What happened to it being like knowing you
still have toenails?"

"I need to direct my attention to pick up details like
that," Soren said, feeling lost. His lack of reaction was more disconcerting than any towering rage. "Turn to the page of the book, open that
particular window in my mind – whatever analogy you care to use. I haven't been looking at the Rose." She fidgeted with her knife, then began
segmenting a peach as if lives depended on the result.

It was not until her eyes were turned away that Strake
revealed the blow. Soren struggled not
to react to the piercing hurt suddenly evident on his face, the loss and pain
rapidly overtaken by anger. One of his
hands closed on the table's edge; strong, finely-made fingers gripping cloth
and wood as he stared at Soren, so assiduously bent over the task of dissecting
breakfast. On the verge of throwing the
table at her.

Then he sighed and passed his hand across his eyes, slumping
back. Controlling his anger, as he had
promised. Soren waited a moment more
before looking up, feeling sick. It was
so hard to know how to deal with this man who was her King. Making him not hate her seemed quite as
important as ensuring he didn't die.

"I don't think it likely anyone but Lord Aristide would
have seen it," she said, because she guessed that Strake would only
withdraw if she pushed. "Few go
into the Garden. And I've hidden it
now."

"They'll see you soon enough," Strake replied,
dourly. But the anger was a dull simmer,
no longer directed at her. "I
suppose I should look on this positively. An heir would be just the thing to soothe the nervous once news of my
imminent death gets out. It is something
I would have had to see to in due course."

But at his own speed and choosing. He didn't have to say it.

"Your death hasn't been very imminent," Soren
said.

"No."

"Perhaps the flower is black because of the period when
you weren't alive, even if you weren't really dead. It mightn't be a future event at all."

"Very optimistic." Looking particularly saturnine, Strake pushed back his chair. "We're wasting time."

Without another word, Strake left the royal apartments,
Soren trailing in his wake. His personal
guard and the carrot-topped Fisk attached themselves, but Fisk was quickly
dismissed and the guards left to stand outside the Treasury. Firmly locking the doors, Strake turned to
Soren with grim expectation, and she suddenly realised that if he succeeded in
destroying the Rose she would lose more than the Champion's burden of sight.

Strake would not be her Rathen.

Chapter Thirteen

"So where is this door?"

Soren, sliding a bar across the inside of the Treasury
doors, gestured toward the far wall. The
Treasury was freshly cleaned, the shelves and benches gleaming and laden with
ornate chests and odd-shaped lumps veiled by dust-cloths. It all looked highly intriguing, and Strake's
order not to open anything must have been particularly frustrating for the
Chamberlain during the turning-out.

Ignoring the mysteries of the chests, Strake crossed to the
centre of the wall opposite the door, where it was unobstructed by
benches. The stony surface was blank and
smooth, with no sign of join or crack. He looked back at her, ever impatient.

Soren touched the wall, aware of an absence, then nodded
when Strake pressed his hand to the smooth stone. "It's waiting for you."

Strake grunted and drew his hand back as Soren felt the lock
change. A thin line of light climbed
from floor to ceiling, expanded and was gone, taking the wall with it. It left a doorway into a yellow-gold room
where dust-motes tumbled in sunbeams above a grimy stair.

"Not sealed," Strake said, surprised. He gazed up into the throat of a massive
bell, suspended high above their heads. It was just possible to glimpse blue sky beyond its circumference,
though the dazzle of light made Soren's eyes smart.

"The sun's only just over the horizon," she
protested. The light couldn't be
natural.

"Redirected." Strake had already started down the stair. "Could be a power source, maybe even for
protection."

That sounded like a reason to not charge blindly forward,
but it was a little late for caution. If
there was any trap, it was not something Soren could feel and at any rate
hadn't blasted her Rathen for trespassing.

As Strake summoned a magelight, Soren followed less
precipitately. The clear, steady glow
picked out every detail of stairs long neglected, filthy with dust and
grime. She'd had at the back of her mind
an image of a long corridor stretching all the way to the Garden of the Rose,
where literal roots were twisted into some form of spell, but as she descended
she saw only a short passage ending in a room with no sign of plant life.

Halfway down the stair, the palace went away.

The simple relief of nothing made Soren pause. Wonderful, how taking one step forward could
make her feel human. But then she
hurried to catch up. Strake would more
likely be protecting her from any attack, but she would observe the forms of
being his Champion. She supposed she
should start wearing the sword again, though she had grown more wary of the
compulsive need to keep it close.

"Stone-deep 'chanting," Strake commented, more to
himself than Soren. He was standing in
the centre of the chamber, looking around at walls of glossy black stone
covered from ceiling to floor in precisely drawn runes.

"What does that mean?" Soren asked, glancing up to
confirm that the runes were on all four walls, even above the entrance. The ceiling and floor were bare. There was nothing else in the room.

She touched the stone, and found it cold and slick, almost
like glass. The runes, white streaked
subtly with pink, were not on the surface, for all they looked painted on. Rather, like the coloured streaks in marble,
they were part of the stone itself.

Strake had not answered her question. She wasn't certain he'd even heard it. Brows drawn into a straight line, he moved to
the wall left of the entrance and commenced reading.

Runes were one way to bind magic to will. You didn't need to have an inner source of
power to use them, just as you didn't really need fingers to paint. Born mages had an affinity which could not be
reproduced, not to mention magic on tap, but of all the different breeds of
enchantment, runes were the most accessible. All you had to do was learn to read them.

Wryly, Soren left Strake to it. With a kerchief and sufficient application,
she was able to clean herself a seat on the stair, just below the point where
she was 'out' of the palace. Then she
sat in the sun among lazy spirals of dust, taking advantage of the unexpected
gift of quiet to think about babies.

The last time Soren had been planning a child she'd been
eighteen and convinced she and Tcharen Esten would be together for the rest of
their lives. They were going to live
happily ever after: the typical girl's dream of an ideal marriage, with only a
third to choose to get them with child. Then Tcharen had discovered
Vetris
Rilmonney
and wanted him to be not a third, but an equal
partner in a tribond.

If she was entirely honest, Soren would have to admit that
Vetris
was not evil incarnate. Or ugly, or corrupt, or something other than
a sharp-witted merchant Soren's love happened to want as well. But Soren hadn't been attracted to him, certainly
hadn't wanted to share Tcharen with him, and it had all been downhill from
there.

Four years was a long time. Soren had trysted with a handful of men and women since, but not
contemplated marriage or babies. Twice
shy, she supposed, or just hadn't stumbled across someone she wanted to set up
housekeeping with, let alone a nursery.

Like Strake, it was not a decision she appreciated having
made for her.

So early on, she simply didn't feel pregnant. But that bud meant a Rathen heir, and she was
fairly certain Strake would have mentioned getting anyone else with child. Wouldn't he?

The image of her King seeding the countryside with Rathens
pulled at Soren's spirits. She knew she
should not feel so intensely possessive about a man she had known for less than
a week, one who had made her no promises and was free to bed anyone he
pleased. A tiresomely rude man with a
too-quick temper and very evident antipathy. She needed to rid herself of this conviction that he was hers.

Besides, if he wanted to ensure the family never died out,
multiple consorts might be a bad tactic. A whole slew of rivals for the throne would create more problems than it
solved.

Dismissing suspicion, Soren thought over the formalities she
would have to put off until she was prepared for the whole world to know. An offering for the child's health in the
Temple of the Moon would be tantamount to a public announcement, and it was
unlikely she could write to her mother with news of a grandchild without the contents
of the letter being inspected. Lord
Aristide already knew, it was true, but there were too many others whose
congratulations might be accompanied by more than a knife-edged smile. At least the usual embarrassment about having
a child without a partner's bonded support wouldn't count for much – polite
social rules didn't count for kings, and the rich never had as much pressure to
provide the security of marriage. The
Rose handily took care of any possible squabble about paternity.

The most she could do was think of names, and even that presented
complications. She'd long intended to
call her first child
Shaol
. The name had been in her family for
generations and would do for a girl or boy, but she wasn't sure she liked it
with 'King' or 'Queen' attached. And
Aluster
Veristace
was sure to
have an opinion. About too many things.