Tyrant Trouble (Mudflat Magic) (16 page)

The
crowd quieted and drew closer to the field to watch. Some signal was given, the
waving of a banner and a scream, as best I could tell. He bowed and drew his
sword in one smooth motion. My breath stopped, and maybe my heart, when he
threw himself forward, diving, it appeared to me, directly onto his opponent's
sword.

Templekeepers
did not shout and did not show preference, Nance had warned me, but she
whispered, “Well done.”

“Well
done? He looks to me like he's trying to kill himself.”

“No,
no! He gains a point. See there, now he is uppermost.”

“But
they will murder each other!”

Nance
grinned. “Sometimes but not very often. Those game swords are made of wood, not
metal, and they are blunt, the edges dull. And lighter than a real sword. They
bruise but don't cut very well.”

As
if that information was going to console me. Okay, in a way it did. It meant I
probably would not see heads actually rolling across the field separated from
their bodies.

The
dances were nicer to watch, and an escape for me as I looked away from the
games and toward the fields beyond the games. I could hear the music in the
distance, light tunes played with the tinkling of bells and the soft thumping
of a drum to keep the rhythm.

Watchers
lined the clearing. Beyond them, small groups gathered in the sunlight to
dance. Dressed in their dull brown and gray clothing, they had tied bright
ribbons in their hair and around their necks and on their wrists, really, it
seemed, anywhere a bit of color could be attached. They twirled in circles
around each other, moved in and out, forming patterns that reminded me of
square dancing. From the distance I could not see the steps they did, but I
could hear their laughter. They swung about each other holding hands, linking elbows,
all very pretty and much more to my liking than the fighting.

When
I looked back at the field, Tarvik stood with another man, their backs to me.
Tarvik was easy to spot with his mop of yellow hair. His companion's hair was a
duller shade. He was a bit taller than Tarvik, and a bit narrower. His leather
tunic left bare his muscular arms.

“Is
that Artur with Tarvik?” I asked Nance.

“Yes,
he serves as Tarvik's companion guard. Handsome, isn't he? They fight together
as a team.”

I
had no idea what she meant until they pulled on their war helmets, turned to
stand back to back, and drew their swords. They were then circled by a team of
four other fighters with drawn swords. Artur and Tarvik turned inside the
circle.

“If
they can hold off the challenging team for a set amount of time, they tie. If
either team drops a sword, the other gains a point.”

“Is
that a fair match, four against two?”

“Not
for some. But Artur and Tarvik always win.”

“What
an odd game. Who thought of that?” I asked stupidly.

“It's
how warriors fight in real battle, covering each other, only then they are
trying to defeat their enemies, not just win points.”

Defeat.
Another word for slaughter?

By
day's end, Tarvik had claimed a handful of medals from his father, winning,
Nance said, more than any other contender.

When
he came toward us and mounted the steps to face Kovat, I turned away, unable to
look at the dirt and clotted blood that covered much of him, nauseated by the
thought of the pain he endured. The boy was as deranged as the rest of them, I
suspected, because he was grinning as he pulled off his helmet and bowed to
Kovat. He seemed extremely pleased with himself.

Turning,
he put his hand over his heart, looked to the other side of where his father
sat, smiled, and bowed again. Nance and I tried not to be too obvious, but hey,
we had to swivel around to see. Alakar nodded and gave Tarvik a quick smile,
and damn, the girl even batted her eyelashes at him.

She
really was a girl and I am not being petty. Way too young to be promised to
anyone, I would have guessed her at ten except for the figure. Standing, she
might have come up to Tarvik's shoulder, a little bit of a child-sized thing,
except for the voluptuous bod. Nance and Alakar were about the same height.
Comparison stopped there. Nance was cute. Alakar was glamorous.

“Good
thing he chose her to bow to,” Nance whispered.

“Either
of us would have told him to go wash,” I agreed and she giggled.

“She
travels in the shadow of her mother's deathwalker. So almost anyone looks good
to the silly hen, even our Tarvik.”

“About
the deathwalker, get a look at his boot toes if you can.”

“Far
more fun to watch my cousin play lover.”

It
was hard to believe such a muddy, bloody boy could arrive at the evening
banquet with clean hands and face, wearing dark red velvet with fur collar and
cuffs and a fair amount of gold bangles. He even wore a crown that night, a
small gold circlet inlaid with a pattern of red stones that sparkled in the
candlelight.

“Garnets,”
Nance said. “Tarvik's favorite jewel.”

“Garnets?
He mentioned something about a garnet prince.”

“That's
Tarvik's position as the heir of the line of Kovat. It's one reason he likes
garnets, but the other, ah, look at him dressed in red velvet.”

“It's
his favorite color?”

“It's
his favorite self,” she scoffed. “He knows he's handsome and he likes showing
off.”

“Then
you'd think he wouldn't take chances on getting cut and scarred.”

Nance
giggled. “The only thing he likes better than dressing up is doing anything
that gets him top to toe muddy.”

That
evening's banquet exceeded the previous one in both sound and length. Too much
rich food and too much drink and more noise and shouting and arguing. As though
there had not been fighting enough at the games, occasional guests fell on each
other and had to be pulled apart and sometimes carried out of the hall.

“Wish
they'd carry out Ober's guard with his feet in the air. Gotta have pointed toes
on his boots.”

“He
neither eats nor drinks,” Nance said.

“Honestly?”

“The
dead don't.”

We
hung in there for a while hoping he'd walk past us, but no luck, and feeling
beat from the long day, we cut out. When we returned to the temple, we could
still hear the noise from the castle.

Odd
though. When we left the castle with our guard, the deathwalker still stood
behind Ober like a frozen shadow on the wall. As we went down the path, I saw
tree shadows shiver in the wind. And then between them, clear on an open
stretch of starlit path, I saw another shadow, long, a hood shape at the top,
for the time it took to blink and then it was gone. Not even time to elbow
Nance to look.

“Be
careful tonight,” I said to the guard. “I think someone followed us.”

I
guess no one ever said anything like that to him before, because he blinked, stared
at me, then whispered, “Thank you, lady. I will be watchful.”

Nance
wandered inside to her bed and fell onto it fully clothed and covered in paint
and gold threads. I removed the heavy ceremonial robes and the jewels and paint
required by the banquet, untied and unwound my hair and combed it out, then
washed myself top to toes. Before tumbling onto my pile of blankets, I pulled
on a clean linen tunic.

Perhaps
I should have been surprised to hear the pounding on our courtyard gate later
that night, but by now I was rather used to it.

So
when Tarvik began his usual noise, I recognized it, rose quickly before he woke
Nance, grabbed a blanket to toss around my shoulders and ran across the
courtyard to the gate.

I
unbolted it and let him in, glanced at the guard standing there at stiff
attention. It wasn't fun but better than another whack on the head. To Tarvik I
whispered, “Hush, Nance is asleep,” as I closed the gate.

“Did
you see how often I won?” he said, his grin a bright slash in the shadows.

“Hard
to miss, sitting right there at Kovat's feet.”

“But
you looked away when I came up the stairs. Why did you look away?”

“You
were covered with blood and dirt. Umm, I didn't mind the dirt so much.”

His
eyebrows rose. “You minded the blood? But it is hard to fight without a little
blood.”

“I
suppose it is,” I agreed, then thought of his bow after the games, hand over
heart. “Tarvik, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be calling on Alakar?”

He
moved over to stand by the embers in the fire pit at the center of the
courtyard. He was still dressed in the fur-trimmed velvet tunic and velvet
pants and fur boots of his banquet clothing, and wearing a heavy gold necklace
of chains and medallions. He'd left the crown at home.

With
a shrug, he said, “Yes, perhaps no. She is always with her mother and they
retire early.”

“You
could have banged on their door.”

His
blue eyes slid between his narrowed lids and he chewed his lower lip. What was
he thinking that he did not want to say? Was Nance wrong? Were Tarvik and Alakar
in love, in which case, her mother's constant presence must have annoyed both
of them?

“She
is very beautiful,” I said.

He
nodded but still said nothing.

Reaching
out, I brushed his hair back from the side of his face with my fingertips. His
yellow mop felt thick and soft, reminding me of the fur of my long-haired pet
cat back home, but that isn't why I touched him. I was looking for the wound
beneath his hair. On his temple was a jagged cut, a raised red line of dried
blood centered in a purple bruise. I caught his hands in mine, held them in
front of me, and looked first at the backs of them, then at the palms. Rings
gleamed on all his fingers. But even in the shadows I could see the raw
scrapes.

Then
I met his puzzled gaze. “Are you in such a rush to look like your father?”

He
stared at me for a long moment before saying, “I think you speak out of place.”

“Right.
That's me. Out of place. It's only that I don't actually care to see you
injured. Don't you feel the pain?”

“Oh.”
His face relaxed into a smile. “I think you have a very soft heart, Stargazer.”

“That
or a very soft head.”

“I
am sorry you did not enjoy the tournaments.”

He
sounded so disappointed, I said quickly, “I liked the dancing.”

“There
was no dancing tonight.”

“No,
this afternoon. Beyond the game field I could see people dancing in circles,
and they had bells and a drum and ribbons, and oh, it was very pretty to
watch.”

“That
would be the country dances, yes. I join them sometimes on feast days when I do
not have to be at the castle.”

“Do
you?” That surprised me because I remembered the day he brought me to the city,
guiding his horse on a path that wound between the huts of the poor, and
everyone we passed had looked at the ground as though they were afraid to look
at him. “They don't mind? They let you join them?”

“I
take along a couple of servants carrying a few jugs of mead, then ask them to
teach me the dance they are doing.”

“That
would do it.”

“You
think they are afraid of me, as they are of Kovat. They really are not,
Stargazer. Besides, I dance very well. Shall I show you?”

When
I nodded, he said, “These are not dances to do alone. You must join me.”

“But
I don't know your dances.”

“Watch.”
He hummed a tune and circled around me in a series of steps, and I don't know
why I was surprised to see that he could dance. He was well coordinated, light
on his feet.

He
took a step sideways to stand by me, shoulder to shoulder, and caught my hand
in his.

“Now,
you, too, Stargazer, foot out, cross over, yes, good, cross back, two steps to
the side.”

Very
much like square dances. Unfortunately, I'd never done much of that since grade
school and didn't know any steps.

He
slipped the blanket from my shoulders, dropped it on the ground, and put his
arm around my waist. “I love your hair this way, hanging down,” he said.

Humming
softly, he swung me around in a series of steps that pulled us together in a
position more like ballroom dancing and from habit I slid my hand across his
shoulder and turned to face him.

He
stopped. “What are you doing?”

“Sorry,
didn't mean to lead.”

“Lead
what?”

“I'm
out of position, right? Should be side by side or further apart and circling
around each other or something.”

When
I tried to back away, he held me where I was. “You know a different dance. Show
it to me.”

“Umm,
all right, I'm not much good at this. When you step forward, I step back. Yes,
like that. Hmm, this is hard to do without music.”

“How
can I tell which way to step? I need to feel you moving, oh, your dance, you
must be close to each other, this close?” He pulled us together and I gave up.

I
could remain stiff with a few inches between us and our noses practically
touching and my back aching or I could go ahead and dance with him.

“Okay,
Tarbaby, keep humming,” I said.

“What's
a tarbaby?”

Oh
shoot, that had slipped out somewhere between his name and calling him baby
because it was late and I was tired and not thinking too clearly.

Thinking
even less clearly, I said, “It's from a story.”

“Tell
me,” he said, and I figured I might as well because he would pester forever
until I did.

I
gave him the quickie version of Joel Chandler Harris's story. “There was a
clever fox and a tricky rabbit and they had this ongoing rivalry. So the fox
took some soft warm tar and shaped it into a baby doll and sat it in the middle
of the road, then hid himself in the bushes.”

“What's
tar?” he asked.

“Hot
sticky black stuff used to pave roads. It gets hard when it cools. So anyhow, the
rabbit saw the tarbaby and he asked its name. It didn't answer. It couldn't,
but the rabbit didn't know that, so he hit the tarbaby and his paw stuck. That
made him so mad, he hit it with his other paw, then kicked it and kicked again,
and when all four feet were stuck, he butted it with his head.