Magic Casement (44 page)

Foronod
considered and then said, “There will have to be a trial. The proconsul
is apparently dead and the Imperial forces will demand that we hand over the
perpetrators.”

Again
he turned toward the door, and again Rap said, “Stop! “ He looked
to Inos and said stiffly, “Sorry, Inos. I have to do this. Factor, you
owe me a little more time. Bolt the door please, so he can’t escape. That
man is a sorcerer. “

Inos
had to shout over the sudden babble. “Rap, stop that! You insulted Sir
Andor before and I won’t have it! He’s a fine gentleman and I am
going to marry him. “

Rap
shook his head, looking miserable. “I am truly sorry, your Majesty, truly
sorry, but I have to. I wish it could wait until longer after... Well, it has
to be done now. “

“What
exactly has to be done?” Andor inquired softly. Again Rap appealed to
Foronod. “Sir, if I ever did anything for you, will, you please bolt that
door?”

The
factor frowned, shrugged, and went over to the downstairs door, picking up a
massive pewter candlestick on the way. He shot the bolt, turned, and stood with
his back to the door, holding the candlestick like a club.

Inos
caught a pained look from Andor and said, “Rap!” angrily.

“Please,
everyone stand back,” Rap said, and there was a stampede away from Andor,
leaving him in isolation. With studied unconcern he unclipped his cloak and
tossed it gracefully over a chair. He was showing how a gentleman should treat
such rudeness, and Inos felt proud of him.

“Inos-your
Majesty, I mean.” Rap blushed at his error. “When that Andor is in
danger, he turns into something else. It’s the only way I know to show
him up. I’m sorry.”

Inos
gasped at such insanity and the audience muttered. She felt very sad. “Oh,
Rap! What happened to the old Rap I used to know? He was a sane, solid boy, not
given to mad suspicions and delusions. I depended on that Rap! I... I liked
him. “

Rap
turned very pale. He licked white lips and said, “Sorry, Inos,” so
quietly she could hardly hear him.

The
calmest person in the room was Andor.

“Are
you planning to challenge me to a duel, young man?”

“Sort
of,” Rap said.

“Just
you, or your goblin friend as well?”

Rap
shook his head. “Not Little Chicken.” He turned his head and
snapped something in goblin dialect. Little Chicken shrugged and moved away.
That put him closer to old Kondoral, who became alarmed and edged sideways, out
of reach.

“Well,
go ahead!” Andor said. “If you won’t drop that sword I shall
have to make you drop it, as I am the only one armed.”

“You
know you’re a much better swordsman than I am.” Andor shrugged. “A
reasonable assumption, but we shall see. “ Rap looked disgusted. “But
you already know. You gave me lessons. Didn’t you tell her Majesty that?”

Inos
knew that Andor had felt confident of beating Yggingi, a professional soldier. “Darling,”
she muttered, “please try not to hurt him any more than you must. “

Andor
might not have heard that quiet appeal. His blade hissed out, flashing gold
flame back at the sconces. “Last chance! Drop that weapon. “

Rap
shook his head. “This is what you told me once, Andordo you remember? No
more wooden swords, you said. And something about earning the prizes or taking
the punishment. So we play for real-showdown! Those are the rules. Ready?”

“Yes!”
Andor started forward. A huge gray dog slunk in through the door at Rap’s
side, a dog as big as a wolf. It fixed yellow eyes on Andor and bristled
menacingly. Inos heard herself cry out. She tried to move forward and Aunt Kade
grabbed her wrist. The palace dogs had always followed Rap around... Andor
froze. Then he raised his left hand to his right shoulder, covering his neck
with his arm.

Rap
pointed, but the monster was already creeping forward toward Andor, who now
began to back away, holding his sword stiffly in front of him.

Then
his hip met the table and he could retreat no farther. As if that were a
signal, the dog streaked across the room and flew for his throat like a silver
arrow. Andor’s sword stroke was hopelessly late, but his left arm was
still high enough to catch the fangs. Man and beast fell back across the table
amid a chorus of screams. Table toppled; china and silver and sword rattled
down; the combatants rolled over and crashed to the floor. Aunt Kade released
Inos, took one step, and expertly snatched the burner from below the tea urn as
the um itself toppled. Inos jumped aside hurriedly to escape a great explosion
of tea-most of which seemed to head for Bishop Havyili-noting with relief that
the castle would not burn down this time, either, and then both she and Kade
backed off from the roaring, tangled scrimmage rolling toward their feet.
Mother Unonini seemed to be screaming the loudest. The combatants writhed and
thrashed. The wolf was growling, clothes ripping. Then Rap shouted, “Fleabag!”

The
dog broke loose and backed off, snarling and showing teeth.

The
man on the floor was not Andor. More screaming.

The
romances told of unfortunate women who went mad with grief. Inos wondered now
if this was how such insanity felt, for surely what she saw could not all be
really happening?

He
was huge. Andor’s elegant green doublet and hose had split in places and
been ripped in others, revealing skin and a pelt of yellow hair. His left arm
was dribbling blood, his chest was ripped and bleeding, also, but he was
already sitting up, seeming unaware of his injuries.

“This
is Darad! “ Rap said sadly.

He
was much bigger than Andor, and at least twenty years older. A jotunn, not an
imp. He glared around the room with the ugliest, most battered face imaginable.
Inos shrank back until a chair blocked her. Everyone else seemed to be pressed
against the wall, staring wide-eyed.

Then
the giant snatched up the sword and bounced to his feet. Foronod turned to
unbolt the downstairs door.

“Stop
that!” the giant roared, and the factor froze. Darad looked to Rap. “Call
off your pet, or I kill it. “

Rap
snapped his fingers and the great dog withdrew unwillingly, teeth bare, yellow
eyes fixed on its former opponent. Rap said, “Fleabag!” very
loudly. With obvious reluctance, the dog slunk to his side. “Inos, I’m
sorry about this. I had to warn you. “

She
found her voice. “Who are you? Where is Andor?”

The
mangled face looked at her-cruel blue eyes, cruel. “Come here, Princess.”

“No!”
She tried to edge around the chair, and the monster moved like a striking
snake, taking two huge strides, catching her arm, twisting her round and
crushing her against him, her face in his chest, all in one blur of motion.

He
chuckled gutturally. “Now we have a little security! Any trouble and the
girl dies. “

His
strength was unbelievable-that one huge arm bound her immovably against a chest
like a cliff. The icy touch against the back of her neck must be his sword.
Andor! Andor! There was none of the faint odor of rosewater that she had
noticed on Andor. This man stank of sweat, and faintly of goblin.

Then
she made the mistake of trying to struggle-to bite and kick. Instantly the ogre
twisted her arm up her back and squeezed all the air out of her, as if to show
how easily he could snap her if he wished. Her ribs would collapse, her spine
crack, she could not cry out, there was blackness and a roaring in her head,
agony. Then suddenly he eased off, and she could suck in blessed air and her
brain no longer seemed about to burst.

“Don’t
try that again!” he muttered.

No-Inos
gasped, feeling her heart yammering like a mad bird inside her head, and also
hearing the slower, level thump of the man’s. He did not seem very
worried by his predicament. “Now-the dog behind the door!” he
demanded.

Stupid
Rap! Rap had called up this Darad-monster in place of Andor, but what could he
possibly do to get rid of it? The reverse transformation would not be so easy.

And
Rap was evidently trying to reason. She could not see, but she heard his voice,
harsh and stubborn. “What are you going to do, Darad? You can’t
escape from here. Let her go. Give up! “

She
felt a low growl rising inside the man before any sound came out. “The dog!”
Cold steel touched the back of her neck again.

The
door clicked as Rap obeyed. She felt the giant relax slightly. “Now drop
the sword!”

With
her head so awkwardly twisted, all Inos could see was Aunt Kade’s
horrified face, screwed up in terror. What was Rap doing?

“Drop
it!” roared the giant.

She
heard a thump that might be a sword falling. What were all the men doing? But
they must be all hopelessly frozen. Again she felt that cold touch of steel at
the nape of her neck.

“Now
make your friend throw down his dagger!”

There
was a pause, and she supposed Rap was obeying that order, also. She heard the
goblin argue, then stop.

“That’s
much better!” the giant said. He spoke poorly and was probably
slow-witted, although he could move faster than anyone she had ever seen. Blood
from his arm was soaking through her doublet-she could feel it, like hot soup. “Away
from the door, all of you!”

“You
can’t escape!” That was Foronod. “Can’t I? Then the
girl dies first.”

“No,
you can’t!” Rap again. “Call Sagorn. He’s better at
thinking, isn’t he?”

But
the men must have cleared the doorway, because Darad began to edge around the
room, half carrying, half dragging Inos, keeping his sword arm toward the men.

She
saw Aunt Kade and Mother Unonini, side by side, eyes wide with horror, mouths
open. Darad went right by them, no doubt assuming that women were harmless.

But
Kade was still holding the burner from the tea urn, and as soon as Inos was
safely shielded by the giant’s body, she removed the cover, took two fast
steps forward, and threw burning oil all over his back.

Darad’s
agonized scream exploded against Inos’s eardrums. She was hurled aside
and fell headlong to the rug, hearing the sword clatter on floorboards nearby.
She caught a glimpse of Rap and the goblin leaping forward as Rap seized a
chair and swung it two-handed, shattering it on the giant’s head. Even
then, Darad seemed to throw himself down, rather than fall. He rolled over on
his back to extinguish the flaming cloth, and Little Chicken landed on him with
both feet. He jackknifed, throwing off the goblin, and had already started to
rise when Rap disassembled more of Aunt Kade’s rosewood furniture over
his head. Then Rap reached for a third chair, but it was not needed.

Kade
and the chaplain hurried to help Inos. The goblin bounced to his feet, lunged
across the room, grabbed up Andor’s discarded cloak, and was already
ripping it into strips as he raced back to the prostrate jotunn. With
astonishing speed, as if they had been practicing as a team, he and Rap bound
the man’s hands and feet, and suddenly the emergency was over.

Inos
allowed Mother Unonini to lead her to the sofa, but then she pushed the
chaplain away, not wanting anyone very close at the moment, for she was
trembling, and queens must not tremble. She sat down and folded her hands in
her lap and tried to concentrate on being regal. She was covered in cold tea
and Darad’s blood, of course, which did not help.

The
older men were gathered around Kade, congratulating her on her quick-wittedness.
Kade was preening, enjoying it. Not one of those men had done a damned thing of
any use that Inos had seen, except stamp out a smoldering rug. It had all been
Kade and Rap and Little Chicken.

The
monster lay on the floor, tightly bound and reeking of burned hair. His back
must be very painful, and his arm and head were still oozing blood, but he was
staying silent, just glaring up furiously at the goblin, who was sitting
cross-legged on his chest, leering triumphantly at him and playfully drawing
little patterns in front of his face with the bloodstained dagger.

Rap
was standing guard there, too, with the proconsul’s sword in his hand. He
was worried and seemed to be watching the goblin as much as the jotunn.

And
now what was going to happen? Surely she could not take any more shocks this
night? And she did not have Andor to lean on any more. Oh, Andor! She felt a
great emptiness in her life first Father, and then Andor...

Foronod
stepped out of the group, accosting Rap. “You said you had an excuse for
your horse thievery?”

Rap
flushed. “Yes, I do. Andor!”

“You
were still at least an accomplice!”

“He
used occult power on me!”

Foronod
grunted, sounding skeptical. The gangling jotunn could look down on Rap and was
doing so now. There were very few men in Krasnegar who could withstand the
factor’s authority when he was in that mood, but Rap thrust out his jaw
and scowled around the circle of other men, who were all listening intently.

“And
on you!” he shouted. “You were going to accept him as king! “

He
had struck a nerve there, the factor flinched. “In any case you now must
answer a murder charge-you cannot blame Andor for that.” He paused,
suspicious. “How did you get up there, anyway? Either you’ve got a
lot more occult power than you ever admitted, or you had accomplices.”

“Accomplices?”
Rap could look extraordinarily stupid when he wanted to. He turned his idiot
expression on Inos. “Your Majesty? Do I answer this man’s
questions?”

Foronod
spun on his heel. He was already at the door before Inos had scrambled to her
feet.

“Factor!
We did not hear your request for permission to withdraw.” Was that her,
really her?

The
tall man swung around and returned her glare. “Good night, miss!”
He bowed perfunctorily.