C. Dale Brittain Read online

  “Not us! No, not us! Even the Wanderers don’t come into our tunnels! Only faeys and mortals we invite. And we only invite you!”

  “Then who told you?”

  Here their answers were so contradictory, so confused, that it was at best a guess that they might have learned this from the Weaver.

  “And what do the Wanderers want with him?” she tried a third time.

  But either the faeys really did not know, or the prospect of telling her was even worse than her threats not to see them again. After a few minutes, agreeing somewhat reluctantly than she would indeed come visit soon, she crawled out, back into the dell, and pushed the stone shut immediately behind her, knowing the faeys would all be huddling far back in their tunnels until the threat of direct sunlight was gone.

  She adjusted her cloak around her and hurried back toward the castle. She had to speak to Roric as soon as she could get him alone, to discover if he knew anything of this. For some reason she was still reluctant to tell him about the faeys, though he was certain to ask how she came by the startling information that the Wanderers wanted him.

  Had he in fact already met a Wanderer himself? His eyes had looked strange yesterday morning when she found him at the stables, but anyone who had escaped death and ridden all night would be wild-eyed, even without a conversation with the lords of voima.

  There might still be some things, she thought, that he felt reluctant to tell her, as she kept the secret of the faeys. They had had, both of them, to learn control, to use caution in a castle where they were at the same time family members and outsiders. She passed the little valley where an oak’s low-spreading branches made a hidden bower. It was here, three weeks before, that she and Roric had lain together for the first and only time, wrapped up in both their cloaks, laughing and kissing and pledging eternal love to each other.

  Their future together had looked so hopeful then, and Roric had been so sure that Hadros, who had been a father to him his whole life, would raise no objections. That hope had lasted until last week when he had finally decided the moment right to raise the topic.

  Karin scraped the last of the porridge out of the pot and sat down to eat at the opposite end of the table from King Hadros. “I went for a walk,” she said shortly when he looked a question at her. Her firmly set jaw and lowered eyes kept anyone else from speaking to her.

  The king’s sons were discussing the horses. It was the season to bring the mares and the young foals in from pasture, to introduce the foals to humans and rebreed the mares, and almost time to start breaking the yearlings for riding. She listened absently to their conversation as she finished breakfast and braided her hair.

  “We’ll have to see how well the foals came out this year,” said Valmar with a laugh. He was the king’s oldest son, two years younger than Karin, and had red hair and dark blue eyes with lashes that had always seemed to her too long for a boy. She still thought of him as her little brother, even though in the last few years he had shot up from boyhood to young manhood. Though most men stayed clean-shaven until marriage, he had managed to grow a somewhat patchy beard. “And we’ll have to see if the mares will be satisfied to be covered by an ordinary stallion this time. I’m afraid Roric’s troll-horse may have sired some of this year’s crop!”

  His younger brothers, Dag and Nole, laughed too, then glanced toward her as though recalling her presence and stopped abruptly. They all knew better than to say anything that could possibly be considered crude or lewd in her presence, but King Hadros did not seem to have noticed.

  Valmar rose. “Coming with us, Father? Or is your knee still bothering you?”

  Karin looked up sharply at that. The king sat with one leg extended straight out from the bench. “Oh, my leg is fine,” he said easily. That was the leg, she recalled, that he had broken in the fall last year—or was it the year before? “But perhaps I shall let you go ahead and catch up with you.”

  His three sons clattered out, taking the housecarls with them. Karin stood up with a swirl of her skirt, thinking that she would work in the weaving house; it did not require much concentration, once the pattern was established, and the tension burning inside her needed an outlet. The maids would be impressed at how fast she threw the shuttle today.

  But King Hadros motioned to her. “Come here, Karin. I would speak with you.”

  He smiled when he spoke, and she went somewhat reluctantly to sit beside him, looking at him steadily. Hadros was no taller than she but twice as wide, all of it muscle. He had little white scars all over the backs of his hands and arms and a long one on his cheek, which just barely did not reach his eye. Ever since she was fully grown, she could usually manage to talk and smile him into being agreeable.

  Today she was less sure that she could control herself. This was the man, she thought, who had ordered Roric murdered.

  But the man she saw now was the one who had taught her to ride, the man who had given her the direction of his household when the queen had died and she was still only a girl herself. She had known him both in riotous good humor and in black rages, especially when he had sat drinking long with his warriors. It was Hadros who, when she had first started developing a woman’s body, and one of the housecarls had made a remark to her so coarse that she had been another year older before she understood it, had seized the man by the neck and smashed him to the floor with such force that he died. But at some point, almost without her noticing, Hadros had developed lines in his tanned face and gray in his hair. And she had never before not known him to lead when they brought in the foals.

  There were voices and the sound of hooves in the courtyard. She glanced through the open door to see that Roric, riding Goldmane, had joined the king’s sons. His rather ferocious good looks, straight dark eyebrows over deep-set eyes, a muscled body always in motion, usually made her heart turn over, but today she felt more irritation than anything else. In the one glimpse she had of him he appeared carefree, and he did not glance at all in her direction. Could he have forgotten already?

  “I had not realized your leg was bothering you again,” she said, turning back to the king.

  He shrugged. “I have not spoken with you for nearly two days, Karin,” he said, “since I had to tell you about your brother. By now I hope you have adjusted to the news.”

  Oh no, she thought. Here it comes. He’s going to ask me to marry Valmar—or even himself.

  Instead he smiled and tucked a finger under her chin. “So sober, my little princess.” He had not called her that in years. “I know you realize this makes you heiress to your father’s kingdom. The All-Gemot of the Fifty Kings will be held at his castle this year. Would you like to accompany me across the channel?”

  This was not at all what she had expected him to say. The All-Gemot, she thought wildly. She had contemplated it during the long hours two nights ago when she had sat up, dressed, in the dark, listening to the restless tossing from the king’s bed. If Gizor and his thugs had killed Roric, she would have found some way to accuse Hadros before the Fifty Kings.

  She had not known the All-Gemot would be held in her own father’s kingdom. She tightened her lips. They had sent her out a prisoner, a little girl, someone less important than Hadros’s offer of peace. But she would be coming home a woman and a future queen.

  “Yes,” she said gravely. “I would very much like to accompany you.”

  “There are a few sovereign queens already among the Fifty Kings,” he said. “And I’m sure you know it is not always fifty anymore. Last year I think there were sixty-three in attendance, including several from those little kingdoms up north—though it was quite an act of courtesy to call them kings!”

  “How soon will we leave?” Roric might be among the warriors to accompany the king—or Hadros might use the opportunity to try again to have him killed here at the castle while his own hands stayed clean. She wondered if there was any way to ask the king to bring him along.

  “Ten days. And you will want to bring your finest clothe
s. I am sure you remember the standards those kings south of the channel set for themselves! We will not be thought another little upcountry kingdom.”

  She had not considered that, and for a few seconds she ran in her mind through the fine clothes stored in the bottom of her chest—the red silk dress she had worn when she came here had not fit for nine years. She did recall that, when she first arrived, this court had seemed crude, unrefined, but she had already been ready to hate everything about it. She could scarcely remember her own mother, who had died when her younger brother was born, but now that she thought about it she was quite sure the queen had not worked in the weaving house or done her own brewing.

  “And the All-Gemot will be an excellent opportunity to announce your betrothal to Valmar.”

  Karin took a sharp breath, then bit her lip. He had brought it up when she had almost forgotten to fear he would.

  The king smiled at her as though he had just offered her a treat. “I could not of course urge Valmar on you while you were a hostage here. No man could say that King Hadros made war on girls. But once you are home you shall be able to make your choice freely. You two have spent a lot of time together ever since you were children—I helped make sure of that. By now you must know he’ll make you a fine husband.”

  It was his expectation that she would be delighted at this generous offer that made her answer hotly. “Valmar? But why should I marry him? The beard can’t hide it. He’s nothing but a stripling boy!”

  She stopped, seeing his surprise and, yes, disappointment. Whatever she wanted to argue with King Hadros about, it was not the manliness of his oldest son.

  But where she had expected hot words in return, he said quietly, “He is still young, Karin. Perhaps you would prefer to wait a year or two. There has mostly been peace of late among the Fifty Kings, and even the upcountry bandits and southern booty have provided less opportunity for boys to be hardened into warriors. Most of the ships now on the channel are merchants’ ships, not war ships. I had already killed three men in combat when I was Valmar’s age.” She thought he was finished, but then he added, almost under his breath, “Of course, there are some, like Roric, who do not need war to make them men.”

  She clenched her fists until the nails bit into her flesh. “And he is the man,” she said in a voice that she was dismayed to hear tremble, “that I shall marry.”

  Again she expected a hot answer, but Hadros only went perfectly still for ten seconds, then turned to look at her gravely. “He did not say he had spoken to you already . . .”

  She caught herself just in time from shouting, “And would that have made any difference in your ordering him killed?” Instead she kept her fists clenched at her sides and asked as evenly as she could, “And how can you possibly object to my marrying him?”

  “You have always been a princess, even before your brother died. You were a hostage, but I intended to treat you as though you were my own daughter, and no man without a father could marry a daughter of mine.”

  “You’re his father just as much as you’re mine.” She spoke in a low, intense voice. No one else was in the hall, but there might be highly interested maids outside the open doorway.

  He pulled out his dagger and started trimming his nails, not looking at her. “Don’t be childish, Karin,” he said, and it was only the faintest unsteady note in his own voice that kept it from being patronizing dismissal. “You know I never formally adopted him, even though my queen loved him, even though the lords of voima had not yet granted us sons of our own. He is my sworn man, but I would as soon see you married to Gizor One-hand.”

  “Well, small chance of my wanting that!” she said, trying desperately to laugh. She started to ask why then, if he never intended to adopt the baby found at the castle gate, he had had his own wife raise him, but she closed her mouth without asking.

  Hadros glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “And Roric is too young to marry anyone,” he said slowly.

  “He’s five years older than Valmar!” she thought but did not say.

  “He could still carve out a lordship for himself, maybe in the upcountry, maybe somewhere along the coast. My own grandfather won this kingdom in war, and even in these more peaceful times—and maybe especially in these more peaceful times—there is room for a man of courage to rise high through his own strength. I would not see him shackled to a wife and a fancy southern kingdom.”

  Karin slowly digested what this implied of the king’s attitude toward his own oldest son. At last she said, very quietly, “But Roric could be fated to die in his first battle as easily as to win renown.”

  “And I,” said the king, just as quietly, “would rather see him dead than wasting the strength within him.” He rose abruptly to his feet. “I had better see how those lads are getting along with the foals.”

  3

  Valmar shouted and waved his hat to turn the mare, then dug his heels into his gelding to pursue her down the line of trees. She saw the pen at the bottom too late, and before she could turn again both she and the foal running at her heels had had the gate slammed behind them.

  He pulled up, panting and wiping his forehead with his sleeve. “Is that all of them?” he yelled to Roric.

  Roric sat on the fence, relaxed and self-assured, counting horses. He wore a sleeveless leather jerkin that showed all his muscles—Valmar hoped he would have arms like that some day.

  Even though the mares had been running free all spring and were nervous about letting anyone near their babies, they were used to King Hadros’s men and were already calming down. “I think we’re still short one mare,” Roric called to him. “Has anyone seen the spotted one?”

  Just then the spotted mare, with a jet-black foal beside her, appeared at the top of the hill. Nole, Valmar’s youngest brother, was right behind her, but she wheeled and darted away again, Nole and a half dozen housecarls at her heels.

  Roric swung back up on Goldmane. “Should we give him a hand?”

  Valmar smiled and shook his head. “Let him catch at least one by himself.”

  Roric stilled his stallion with a firm hand on the reins and looked at the pen full of circling mares. But Valmar, watching, thought he did not see them. Ever since he had quarreled with the king last week, and especially this last day and a half, since he had returned from his errand to the manor, Roric had not been himself. He could still joke with the king’s sons and ride a horse who would not allow anyone else on his back, but any time there was a pause his face took on an expression as though his thoughts were a hundred miles away.

  And his own father was also acting strangely. Valmar was still not sure what Roric’s remarks had meant when he came home the morning before, or why his father had listened to them without saying anything at all.

  “Tell me,” said Valmar suddenly, “why you and Father quarreled.”

  Roric gave a start, then smiled what appeared to be his normal smile. “I gather we were heard all over the castle. But men sometimes say things when they have sat too long drinking that they later regret.”

  “Is that why you slipped away last night rather than drinking with us?” But as he spoke he remembered: that shouting match in the hall with the door closed, the voices loud though the words were indistinct, had taken place in the middle of the morning.

  “I just had somewhere to go,” said Roric offhandedly, though Valmar, watching his face, thought there was more here than he wanted to say.

  “Even though you quarreled with Father,” Valmar asked, “will you stay at the castle? Will you continue to serve him—and,” he added almost shyly, “once I am king, will you serve me?”

  This time Roric looked disconcerted, as though he had not thought this through. “I do not know,” he said, not quite meeting the other’s eyes. “There are reasons—the lords of voima know what powerful reasons—for me to stay, but something has happened that may mean I shall go away for a while . . . How about you, Valmar?” he added suddenly and with a grin. “Are you going to t
ravel far and boldly, to win a fortune and a place in all the songs?”

  It was Valmar’s turn to be disconcerted. “But I could not leave,” he said slowly. He had grown up knowing he would someday inherit this kingdom and had never seriously considered going elsewhere—even if the day he would inherit always seemed impossibly far in the future. “Without someone directing the castle, nettles would invade the fields, deer roll in the meadows, geese nest in the forest clearings—”

  “Here comes Nole,” said Roric. “He has her this time.”

  As the spotted mare galloped down the hill, a band of shouting men on her tail, Valmar glanced up to see a single rider in the distance, silhouetted against the sky. Father was coming after all, he thought. He would try to talk to Roric privately some other time.

  The three brothers, Roric, and the housecarls leaned on the fence to look at the foals. Valmar was glad now that his father had not accompanied them. When Hadros reached here in another minute, he would find everything as it should be. Valmar had showed he could be trusted with the horses, and the housecarls had all obeyed him today without any of the humoring he sometimes sensed, the faintest suggestion that he was still a child.

  “The mares should have all been bred to Midnight this year,” he said. “Father said that black colts have been doing especially well at market recently. So tell us, Roric,” with a elbow for his ribs, “where did those two sorrel foals come from?”

  “Don’t ask me!” he protested. “I do not set my stallion at stud without charging for it!” In the middle of a laugh, his face changed abruptly.

  Valmar whirled to look where he was looking. His father had ridden to within a dozen yards of the pen.

  Except that it was not his father.

  The housecarls and Valmar’s two younger brothers fled, kicking their horses wildly. But the mares in the pen went dead still, and the birds above them fell silent. Roric turned slowly to greet the rider. Valmar, behind him, was too frozen to move. This was a creature out of the recurring nightmare he had had as a boy, the nightmare he hoped he had finally outgrown, coming to meet him in broad day.