One Good Knight (25 page)

She rather hoped that the Champion was. The more she thought about it, the more she hoped. Really, Gina had been very nice to someone that she'd had no real reason to like. After all, if it wasn't for Andie, where would she be now?

On some other uncomfortable Quest?

Well, maybe. Or maybe still at the Chapter-House.

And Andie was the one who had thrust herself on a reluctant Gina. The Champion had no reason to be happy about that.

But she said herself that having me along made getting around the countryside easier.

Still, when it came right down to it, Andie had
been an inconvenience. Yet Gina had never made things uncomfortable for Andie. And once she'd been revealed as being another girl—

I'd really like her for a friend.
She looked around at the other young women clustered about the makeshift table, which looked as if someone had taken a slab of the fallen stone of the fortress walls and set it on four stumpy columns.

Actually, someone probably had—that someone being one of the dragons.

I'd like to have all of them for friends,
she found herself deciding in surprise. Uncommon trial and hardship, danger and uncertainty had brought them together, but they were making the most of it, and even seemed to be finding ways to enjoy themselves. They'd come to some sort of understanding, it seemed, because she honestly couldn't tell any differences of rank among them by the way they behaved toward one another.

Even as she thought that, she took a place on a stone bench and the one nearest her passed her the plate of flatbread with no deference or other acknowledgment of rank. Just simple politeness. “Sorry we don't have any fruit,” Amaranth said apologetically. “Everything is either green or gone.”

Andie spread yogurt over the flatbread and drizzled on honey. “This is good!” she said around a mouthful. “This is fine.” And in fact, it was. It was—

It was the first time in her entire life that she had sat down at a table with girls her own age that
weren't her mother's handmaidens and ladies. The first time she had sat down with girls who weren't either ignoring her as the unimportant Princess or giving her false deference.

The first time she had sat down with girls who spoke to her as if they were speaking to another human being.

It was amazing. It was more than amazing. It was eye-opening.

It was wonderful.

She listened to them banter and tease each other, wonder what on earth Peri and Adam were going to do today—evidently the word was in the wind that they were “up to something” this morning—trade off on chores and other things, and then turn and ask her or Gina a question or two. Gina fascinated them—small wonder, most of them had never seen a female Warrior before, while Andie'd had them around her all her life. They wanted to know about the Chapter, the Chapter-House and, most of all, about Godmother Elena.

Finally the last bite was gone and the girls dispersed to their various chores. Gina went out hunting again; evidently none of the other girls had ever taken up the bow, and meat tended to be rather scarce except when the dragons brought it in. That left Cleo and Andie alone with the table and the dirty dishes.

There weren't a lot of dishes; the cups from which they had drunk their herbal tisane, the plates that had held the flatbread, the bowl that contained the
yogurt and two horn spoons. When the last of the girls was gone, taking the leftovers back to the kitchen with her, Cleo gathered up the lot in a big, flat basket. “I'll show you where to go,” she said, and led the way down into the valley.

They went farther downstream from the place where Andie had fetched the water yesterday, which only made sense, since you wouldn't want to drink water in which you'd just washed things. Cleo stopped at a spot where there was a shallow ledge running off into the stream. “Here,” she said, putting the basket down and pointing at a patch of coarse reeds growing in the mud where the stone shelf ended. “Grab a handful of horsetail there and scrub everything out twice.”

She sauntered back up the trail. Andie tentatively grasped about half a handful of horsetail and tugged. She recognized it from her botany lessons and from the fact that some of it grew in and around the ornamental ponds at the Palace. But she'd never actually had any of it in her hands before.

She couldn't imagine why Cleo found this chore so onerous. It was pleasant down here in the valley, with birds singing in the trees overhead, the gurgling of the stream around her, and her spot nicely shaded from the hot sun. Oh, her knees started to ache after a while, kneeling on the hard stone, but it wasn't that bad, and anyway, she could take a break by sitting cross-legged, or sprawling on the stone, and listening to the forest for a while.

The task didn't take long. And though the walk back was somewhat difficult up a fairly steep path as it was, and though the dishes were both heavy and awkward, she found she didn't mind in the least. She had actually washed a full set of meal dishes! That was something altogether novel in her life—something
other
people did. And perhaps today she would also learn how to wash clothing, as well.

Perhaps for anyone else, the day would have been one of drudgery and boredom, but this was all new to her. People in her position never learned how to wash dishes, or to cook, or to do any of the myriad of things she was learning to do.

She helped with lunch preparations, slicing up mushrooms after cleaning them, stacking finished flatbreads with a dusting of flour between them so that they didn't stick. She had never seen anyone make flatbreads before. It was fascinating. She longed to try it herself, but didn't want to ask, because she knew very well she would ruin her first attempts and she had the feeling that there simply wasn't food to “waste.”

Luncheon was like breakfast had been, except that more of the girls talked to her this time. They seemed relieved when she would say, of this or that task, “I don't know how, but if you could show me, I'll try.”

Another of the girls, Helena, was perfectly happy to teach her how to wash clothing, and they spent the afternoon down by another set of rocks, pounding and scrubbing at their garments until they got
almost all of stains and dirt out, then spreading them on the bushes to dry.

“Generally,” Helena said, as she scrubbed vigorously at a stain, “each of us washes her own clothing unless someone asks us to do hers. That's only smart, really—the things we do will put stains in clothing and you feel bad if you can't get them out of someone else's, but worse if they give you a look because you didn't.”

Andie had to laugh at that. Out of a sense of gratitude, Andie had taken Gina's clothing down with her. The only real problem was that the padded tunic and trews that went under the armor were unbelievably heavy when she hauled them up out of the stream, and though she tried hard to squeeze the water out of them, it was clear they were going to take forever to dry.

“Don't put those in the direct sun,” Helena said. “If you do, they'll dry stiff. She'll never be able to get them back on. They'll be like slabs of wood.”

“I don't know how I'm to get them to dry at all, otherwise,” Andie replied.

Helena pondered the problem.

“Let's try pressing some of the water out with rocks.” The svelte, dark-haired beauty's idea sounded feasible.

They spread the garments flat on an expanse of rock shelf, then the two of them piled clean rocks on top of the garments, and before they had heaped up too much, there was already water running from
under the pile. Encouraged, they continued to pile up stones until there was no more sign of squeezed-out water. Tumbling the rocks aside, Andie picked up the tunic. It was much lighter, and barely damp.

With that problem solved, they left the clothes drying—who was here to steal them, after all?—and trudged up to the fortress.

Only to discover Gina waiting for them at the top of the trail. “The dragons want another conference,” she said. “We're meeting in the courtyard. I think—” She hesitated. “I think they want us all to do something about the situation in Acadia.”

Andie looked at her, round-eyed. “Do you think we actually can?” she asked doubtfully. “You're the only Warrior. Where would we get an army?”

Gina shrugged. “Let's hear what they have to say first.”

Once again, Andie found herself in the ruined courtyard with the two dragons reclining in the middle and all their former “victims” arrayed along the edges. And now the thoughts that she had been trying to keep out of her mind all day came charging to the fore again.

And with them the distress that she had tried to hide. Because perhaps it wasn't as bad as it had appeared last night. Perhaps the dragons, after talking more with the fox, had decided that Cassiopeia was not to blame, that she had been under some sort of spell. That she still was. That it was all Solon's fault. Andie could readily believe it was all Solon's fault.

“My brother and I have been having a discussion,” said Peri, when Helena and Andie had taken seats on a couple of fallen columns, and Gina had taken up a position, leaning with crossed arms against what was left of a wall. “This situation in your land, Princess, is intolerable.”

She grimaced. “Yes, but—”

“I wish to ask you some questions, please,” Peri continued. “I keep a detailed chronicle of the information I receive when I negotiate our trades with the Wyrding Folk. I went back over it today, looking for some clues. Now, how familiar are you with the arrangements between the traders and the Crown?”

“Fairly,” she replied, nonplussed. What could that have to do with anything they'd been discussing?

He nodded with evident satisfaction. “The Wyrding Folk seem to be under the impression that most of the wealth of your Crown comes from fees and taxes on those traders who use your port, which is the only safe anchorage for quite some ways up and down the coastline.” He peered keenly down his long nose at her.

“That's quite accurate, to a point,” she replied thoughtfully. “Though, there is another source of income that no one really likes to talk about, and that is the income from wrecks. The Queen gets one-third of everything that is gleaned off the shoreline after a wreck. Unless, of course, it's shoreline belonging to the Crown—then she gets all of it.”

Peri blinked. His eyes held a furtive greenish light
in their depths. Or was that only the effect of the sun? “Now that,” he said, “is interesting. So. If, say, the weather along the shores of Acadia began to worsen, the Queen would benefit no matter what. Those traders seeking to avoid the port and the taxes and fees by landing somewhere and smuggling their goods in would suddenly find they were losing ships to storms. The Queen would profit by what washed ashore, and profit again when these traders elected to stop trying to avoid the taxes. True?”

“Well,” Andie replied. “Yes.”

She was beginning to feel sick again. She did not like where this was going. Not at all. Because—

Because it was beginning to look as if either Solon had gotten complete control over everything her mother said and did, like a puppeteer, or—

—her mother was complicit in the whole dragon business.

Including trying to kill her own daughter.

Because Solon himself did not have nearly as much to do with the trade negotiations as Cassiopeia did. They bored him, for one thing, or so he said. For another, the Queen liked to have them firmly and completely under
her
control. And hers alone.

“The Wyrding Folk tell me that the weather has, in fact, worsened significantly. So much so that the current storms outmatch anything in their memories and records.”

Since this seemed to be a statement and not a question, Andie simply nodded.

“So, can you tell me if the Queen has been renegotiating her arrangements with the traders of late?”

Andie's mouth dropped open at that question. Suddenly she was putting together a great many answers in her own mind that were making her even sicker at heart than she had been before this.

No,
she moaned in her mind.
Oh no, please not…
But her teacher in logic had been ruthless, and if there was one thing he had taught her it was that a question or a train of thought must be pursued to its likeliest conclusion, no matter how unpleasant.

Except that the word
unpleasant
was not nearly strong enough.

“Yes…she's raising the port fees. But—” she shook her head “—there's more, far more to it than that. This bad weather is doing some awful things to the fisherfolk,” she continued, feeling more ill with every word. “And to the farmers and herdsmen along the coastline. The fishermen are not able to go out as often, and people are losing crops and livestock.”

“But the profit to the Queen from her agrarian folk and fisherfolk is minimal, compared to that from the traders, is it not so?” Peri said in veiled triumph. His head was up, and his cheek-frills fanned.

Andie bit her lip. She was seeing more than she wanted to see. “Much less.”

“And if the Queen is aware that her Adviser is a Magician—”

“Oh, she knows,” the fox piped up, from where he was curled, quite comfortably, in Cleo's lap. “She
counts on it. He does things to people that she wants to give way to her. I don't know what else he does, but I know he does that. I've listened to her give the orders, and I've even seen her watch while he does the magic.”

“Did you ever see him work weather magic?” Peri asked with great care, clearly enunciating every word.

“Weather magic?” The fox's ears flattened a moment as he concentrated, then his ears came up again. “Yes. Yes, at least once.”

Peri's eyes blazed. “One of the most common magical workings is weather magic,” he said with a certain grim elation. “Clearly he knows how to do it. If he is manipulating the weather along the coast—”