The Dragon of Despair (6 page)

“It’s a monarchy,” Derian said, glad to still his confusion in recitation, “yet not like ours. Their king—the Healed One—doesn’t seem to have much power.”

“He must have some,” Sapphire said dryly, “or Mother would never have married him.”

Derian decided to overlook this statement.

“The real power seems to be held by someone called the Dragon Speaker. That’s an elected position, like head of a society or guild, not an inherited one. The Dragon Speaker is the first among a group of counselors called Primes. He—or she, the Dragon Speaker can be either, though the Healed One is always male—rules only as long as he has the support of the other Primes. If they grow unsatisfied with the Dragon Speaker, a new one can be elected in his—their current one is male—place.”

Derian took a deep breath.

“There’s more,” he said. “The Dragon Speaker has intimate counselors and the Primes are drawn from different sodalities—those are groups sort of like guilds, but not quite—but essentially those are the basics.”

Derian paused, ready to add detail if King Tedric required. Before Derian had gone to New Kelvin he had studied only a little about the other land’s weird government. After living there for several weeks and traveling with Grateful Peace—who had been a highly ranked member of the New Kelvinese government—he had learned a great deal more.

King Tedric, however, seemed satisfied.

“Now, Derian, you’ve mentioned how the Dragon Speaker can be voted in and out of office,” he said, “but you don’t seem to understand the implications of this. Our informants are members of what might be termed the opposition to the current Dragon Speaker—Apheros, I think his name is.”

Derian nodded and the king went on.

“This opposition views it to be to their advantage to keep us informed about the intimate details of New Kelvin’s governmental workings—hoping, doubtless, that we will become unhappy with some aspect of it and that our unhappiness will unsettle Apheros’s government and ready the way for their own.”

“Seems an odd way to run a nation,” Shad commented, “until I think about what Father has been writing from Bright Bay. I think every government—except possibly the cruelest—relies on consensus and compromise…and on alliances.”

Derian nodded. At any other time, he would have probed for more information on just how King Allister was doing with establishing his regime in Bright Bay, but right now he was more concerned about what King Tedric had said.

“Sire, Prince Shad said we ‘have had’ observers in New Kelvin. Don’t we anymore?”

“Sharp as a sword that boy,” the king chuckled. “Shad, now that Derian has finished proving he knows how New Kelvin’s government works, why don’t you return to the point you were about to raise.”

Shad steepled his fingers and stared into them. Then, seeming to realize that this was a less than dignified posture, he straightened and looked Derian in the eye.

“You’ve hit the problem on the head, Counselor,” he said. “We have had and maybe we still have an embassy in New Kelvin and observers within the Earth Spires; the problem is, we haven’t heard anything from them. News of Melina’s remarriage should have reached us long before the White Water River subsided. It didn’t. That raises concerns. If the news has been kept so quiet that not one among our spies—informants, I mean—heard of it, then how did the man who came to the Kestrels hear of it? If it has begun to leak out, then how have our observers failed to hear?”

“Twisty, huh?” Sapphire commented.

Derian nodded, wondering what they expected
him
to do. King Tedric coughed into his hand, looked suddenly weary, then pushed ahead.

“Since you’re asking your parents for rumors, see if they have heard any about changes in the ranks of New Kelvin’s Primes as well. I don’t suppose you heard anything?”

“Nothing, Sire,” Derian replied.

“That’s worrisome,” King Tedric said. “But perhaps we’re troubling over nothing. Our ambassador could have caught pneumonia. The carrier pigeons could have all died from cold. Our informants—who tend to be among the more highly placed—might not have caught servants’-hall gossip.”

The king tried to sound confident, but Derian wasn’t fooled. Shad changed the subject then, so abruptly that Derian didn’t have the nerve to press.

“There is another matter we’d like to raise with you—using you, as it were, as a touchstone for our common people.”

Shad said that last without a trace of condescension or the faintest shadow of a sneer, simply with an acknowledgment that the people of Hawk Haven fell into two classes: those with titles and those without.

Derian nodded. “I would be honored, Prince Shad.”

“Once again,” the king added, rousing somewhat from his tiredness, a twinkle brightening his faded eyes, “we will be trusting you with a state secret, though this one, by its very nature, cannot be kept secret forever.”

Derian nodded again, slightly puzzled. Then the king glanced over at Sapphire and Shad. Something in the young couple’s bearing gave Derian a hint of what this secret must be.

By mutual consent, Shad spoke for them both.

“Sapphire is carrying our child,” he said, managing to look both proud and embarrassed all at once. “She is two months in and thus far, according to the physicians, is doing just wonderfully.”

“If throwing up one’s insides every morning could be called wonderful,” Sapphire added more mournfully than Derian would have expected from her.

Impulsively, Derian leapt to his feet, offering his hand in congratulations as he would have to far closer friends. He was just regretting his impulse when Shad’s hand—rough and callused enough to show that all his time hadn’t been spent in council chambers—met his own. The young prince’s eyes were shining and Derian realized that this might be the first friendly—rather than formal—congratulations Shad had received on his news.

Derian wrung Shad’s hand firmly, then turned to offer a more decorous bow to the princess. Sapphire, however, was holding out her hand, so he clasped it as well.

“That’s just wonderful news!” Derian said. “Wonderful!”

Sapphire folded her hands complacently over her yet flat belly.

“We certainly think so,” she said, resuming her seat and motioning Derian to his, “and we are wondering just when do you think it would be wise to share the news with our people.”

She held up a hand to forestall Derian answering at once.

“Although I feel quite well,” she said, “the midwives have been honest. A first pregnancy is a delicate thing. The baby may be taken by the ancestors. Would it be best to let the people know now, when there is still much risk, or would it be better to wait until I am more visibly ripening?”

“Tell them now,” Derian said promptly. “No one loved Queen Elexa less for the babies who didn’t make it.”

He turned to King Tedric.

“I’m sorry to have to say such a painful thing, Sire, but it’s a fact.”

King Tedric nodded gravely.

“I know, son, I know. Our concern has come from Sapphire’s rather unusual accession to her position. She was made crown princess because none of my own children lived to succeed me. She was chosen over other candidates for many reasons, but one of those reasons—to be completely honest—is that she is young and strong. Should we risk that perception of strength and of the perpetuity it will bring to the monarchy?”

“Absolutely,” Derian said after a moment’s careful consideration. “Sapphire and Shad have heroic battles to their credit—both in King Allister’s War and during the quelling of the pirates last winter. Everyone knows they are brave. There’s no chance that will be forgotten if they suffer the type of loss too many families know.”

“Very good,” King Tedric said. “Your thoughts match those of many of our counselors. Indeed, we have some small suspicion that those who argue in favor of silence seek to weaken, not strengthen, my heirs’ position with their subjects.”

The king nodded briskly, as if ticking off an item on a mental checklist.

“Very good. Thank you for both your report and your counsel. Tell me, what are your plans for the immediate future?”

Derian took a deep breath. He’d been dreading that this question might be asked. Prince Barden had been disowned by his father. Though the king had not censured Earl Kestrel for leading his expedition west the spring before, that expedition had not found the prince—or rather had found evidence of the prince’s failure. Derian’s self-imposed mission would, in its small, private way, honor a son King Tedric had disowned for his arrogant disobedience of the king’s will.

However, Derian had resolved to answer honestly, no matter that he risked the king’s ire. The king had too many ears and eyes. Moreover, there was the chance that Firekeeper, who worried far too little about incurring anyone’s wrath, had already told the king their plans.

“I’m going west, Your Majesty,” he said a touch stiffly, “to the place where we found Firekeeper. I made a vow after King Allister’s War, a vow to mark the graves of those who died there. I plan to keep that vow.”

King Tedric didn’t look angry, but Derian felt as tight as a strung bow until the king actually spoke.

“Firekeeper said something of that, though in her case I have the impression that she is making a visit to family.”

“That’s pretty much the case for her, Sire,” Derian replied.

King Tedric ran a finger along his jawline.

“Do you mean to mark all the graves?”

“There’s only one grave, Sire,” Derian hedged. Then he decided to continue to be direct. “But I mean to mark it with the names of all the members of the expedition. Lord Aksel Trueheart researched them for me and arranged for them to be cut into several stones I will carry with me.”

Sapphire interrupted, “You’re hauling grave markers?”

“Yes, Princess,” Derian replied. “If I’m going to make the trip, I’d hardly like to leave wooden tablets. I’m sure my father will loan me two mules. I’ll take them and a couple of mountain-bred ponies I brought from Norwood.

“They’re a breed,” he added somewhat inconsequentially, hearing himself the carter’s son, “I’m interested in crossing with riding stock for use in some parts of the kingdom where the land is rough and hilly.”

“I see,” Sapphire said, looking a touch startled at the change of subject. “Well, I admire your thoroughness. I only wish I could go with you.” She patted her belly ruefully. “But duty calls.”

Shad folded his hand over hers. “And morning sickness would be a real problem on the road.”

King Tedric shook his head at his heirs, an old dog watching puppies romp.

“Derian,” he said, “kindly call on me before you and Firekeeper leave. I would like you to carry a few grave goods with you.”

Derian tried not to let his astonishment show, but he knew his eyes had widened. It was one thing for Duchess Kestrel to wish to send something to her daughter’s grave, but from King Tedric it was tantamount to rescinding Barden’s disownment—to taking him back into the ancestry from which he had been exiled.

“Yes, Sire!” he said.

“And keep your eyes and ears open along the road,” the old king said. “It may be you’ll bring me home new rumors.”

Derian nodded, but he sincerely doubted it. The road west should be quiet and deserted once they passed the outskirts of tilled lands. They might meet a trapper or a hunter, but otherwise he expected peace and quiet.

He didn’t know just how wrong he was, or that the old king did indeed have ears and eyes in the most distant points of his realm.

III

FIREKEEPER MIGHT HAVE FIDGETED
more during the days that passed as she waited for Derian to get ready to travel west with her except that she was enjoying visiting with friends she hadn’t seen since late autumn.

King Tedric had invited her to stay at the castle and she had done so without hesitation. The castle backed onto considerable land—not enough to support Blind Seer were he to live there full-time, but enough to give both of them space to run.

Steward Silver had assigned them rooms in the same tower they had stayed in before, one with a staircase that opened into the grounds. The servants knew to let her come and go as she wished. She had permission to ask the head cook for food whenever she wanted it and abused the privilege for a day or two, until Blind Seer told her she was getting a belly like a pregnant doe.

Sapphire and Shad were pleasant to her, but Firekeeper didn’t thrust herself upon them. They were busy making preparations for announcing that Sapphire was expecting. The news had come as no surprise to Firekeeper—pups were always whelped in the spring. What
had
been a surprise was learning that this human pup, though conceived in winter, would not be born until the following autumn.

Humans always make simple things hard,
she said to Blind Seer.

Another simple thing made hard was the situation with Citrine Shield. The girl was apparently as unstable as a water-cut stream bank, though the instability was in her mind, rather than her body. Right now she was going through a phase where she wanted to see no one and so Firekeeper was kept away.

A friend who was always ready to see the wolf-woman was Queen Elexa. The queen was being kept in bed, but she was recovering and it amused her to have Firekeeper come and sit with her.