Fortress in the Eye of Time

CHAPTER 19

There was formal display in the grand hall, which was Herynʼs, like all else; and Cefwyn had not used it since his formal reception by the Aswydds last fall: Herynʼs gold and lavish ornamentations were most evident here, the wealth of the province on bold display. So was Heryn himself, with his Guelen-imposed guard, and with Orien and Tarien, joined by a thin surly scattering of Amefin earls and thanes of Herynʼs retinue among the crowd of visitors and ealdormen of the town itself…the Amefin now being outnumbered by the guests and their attendant bodyguards who crowded the guest quarters and who would soon crowd the hall for the banquet to follow. The tables for that affair were not yet brought in. It was all a standing crowd.

Cefwyn drew a deep breath and walked that center carpet, not looking to the sides, and wondering the while about the safety of his back, on which he felt Herynʼs stare, not unaccompanied by the stare of outraged Amefin nobles.

He reached the middle level of the dais and turned, seated himself in the right-hand seat of the throne set there. Then, stiff with hatred, Heryn advanced as far as the third step from the top, bowed to him, and took that place which the Duke of the Amefin had to accept with the prince-viceroy occupying the throne above him.

“My lords,” Cefwyn hailed them, and the Amefin chamberlain rapped the floor with his staff until silence reigned.

One by one the lords were proclaimed, in order of honors and precedence — himself, Heryn, Pelumer, Cevulirn, Umanon, and Sovrag, with trumpet flourishes and unfurling of banners from their standards, pronouncements of lengthy titles and proclamations of ancestral rights, an ordinarily tedious business, one through which the Crown Prince, and likely the lord being named, might watch the candles, or add chains of figures, or parse antique verbs, or do any number of things to maintain himself awake.

But tonight was an uncommonly late assembly, beneath huge chain-anchored circles of oil-filled lamps, which lent their own odd pungency to the war of perfumes and the aroma of foods waiting in the east hall. Tonight there was a perilous rivalry of voices, of display, of elaboration and martial character, each trying to outdo the other. Cefwyn sat still and watchful throughout, acknowledging compliments and appeals to his personal attention as required, his eyes straying often about the vast ornate hall — easy to become distracted in the forest of serpentine columns and the flash of banners of lords and minor lords. The crowd of Amefin and outsiders alike shifted at each new name, anxiously to estimate each other, to see who was named and who was not, and with what honors. His eyes were not for that detail so much as for the strategic location of his guardsmen, the steel glint of businesslike weapons, the movement of Amefin servants and messengers about the room on, one assumed, needful errands.

As prince, he had to face this assemblage. As prince, he had to hope that no one trod on disputed titles or territory that might bring the knives out. — Sovrag was the one to watch for outright provocation, Umanon for a test of the princeʼs authority to summon them — but grant Umanon would be here among the first if he thought that business might be discussed that could work against him. Wild bulls, his father was wont to call the lords of Imor; and having them in yoke meant contentions his father was accustomed to handle. Watch them, he thought: the barons would try him, they damned well would try him.

“My lords,” he said at last, when all ceremony was done, “we bid you welcome in the hall.”

“My lord Prince.” That was Sovragʼs booming voice, coming from the left-hand assembly, and he looked toward the man, whose blue breeks, gilt-edged green cloak, and dark red doublet made him seem more appropriate to brigandage than to the lordship of a province.

And he foreknew exactly what the matter was that Sovrag would bring; he could, with a little deftness, shift it aside. But Sovrag was unsubtle and in his way easier to manage than, say, Cevulirn, on whom one could get no hold at all. So he nodded assent, beckoned, and the big riverlord came forward and set hands on hips in the center of the hall, upheaving all business, all ceremony, on a point of personal interest.

“My lord Prince, in all respect, welcome we may be, but thereʼs a man of mine in question. Iʼd know about that matter before we set hand to matters of the court. Heʼs a boy, no moreʼn that, and some Ivanimʼs got his nose in the air because my boy walked in front of his damn horse.”

“A hanging offense, my lord of Olmern, thatʼs the issue. Not the damn horse. Nothing else but the drawing of weapons under the Kingʼs peace. Yours is not the only lordship involved.”

Cevulirn stepped forward, as colorless in gray and white as Sovrag was garish. His pale regard was chill and angry. “Since the matter is now public,” said the Ivanim lord in a voice for which others made silence, soft and piercing as a slight. “You have shamed a man of honor and of long and personal service to me, Your Highness. You would have received my protest privily this evening, and it is doubtless awaiting your attention through appropriate process, but since the lord of Olmern brings the matter in public, and since it seems Your Highnessʼ pleasure is to hear it, I will say that I have had a report of the incident. The law decrees hanging. It does not decree the shameful state which you have accorded him.”

“What, shame to be taken to my service? I think not.”

“He was the innocent party, my lord Prince.”

“I judge both guilty. And I give you clear notice now, my lords, in all love and confidence in your good will, if there is further fighting in this town or in this hall, I shall see the surviving participants personally, and deal with them by the Kingʼs justice. These two, Olmernman and Ivanim, I make an example of my mercy. If they serve me well, they will find me a generous lord; if they do not, I have already made judgment of the survivor, and it is severe indeed, Your Grace, be it your man, be it Olmernʼs. I am completely impartial as to which. I will not have weapons drawn or blood shed in this hall or anywhere within this gathering of forces.”

There was silence in the hall.

“Do you challenge my claim on their persons?”

Cevulirn made a bow. “No, Your Highness.”

“Olmern?”

“Aye,” said Sovrag. “You may have the lad, mʼlord Prince, and welcome to him. Heʼs a good boy.” Sovrag frowned at Cevulirn. “But if there be any provocation of my men — from His Grace, there—”

“I am determined,” Cefwyn said, raising his voice, “that there be peace in this hall. I trust you hear me. Shall I have it proclaimed by the herald, whose voice is louder?”

“Beware, lest we all have Guelen guards,” Heryn said.

“Dear Lord Heryn,” said Cefwyn, leaning back on his throne and giving Heryn a sidelong glance. “I rely on the honor of our guests, who are all honorable and proven honorable in good service to the Crown; but such is the love I bear you, Heryn Aswydd, that I shall continue to lend you Guelen guards. Indeed — such is the prevalence of assassins in your domain,” he added, looking around at the others, “that I advise you all to sleep with guarded doors. Mauryl Gestaurien is dead. Doubtless that sad rumor had reached you. There have been now ten attempts on my life, of which the south gate is witness, save the last, where we lost good men in my stead, and yet Lord Heryn swears the district under his control — ah, what else of gossip have I forgot? Armed bandits in the countryside, of which there now are fewer. Perhaps you have had such difficulties, my lords. If so I earnestly pray you advise me.”

“We passed a village at the border south,” said Pelumer, “Trys Ceyl was the name of it — Trys Ceyl and Trys Drun — and the folk in that area begged us stay, grace of a good neighbor, so of that grace and my knowledge yeʼd approve, mʼlord Prince, a handful of my men did stay there. Weʼve had our troubles the last two years on the forest marches: brigandage, livestock stolen, skulkers about the haystacks. Our rangers report no substance we can pursue on any large scale. Movements in the woods, shepherds startled, lost goats. But two of the village folk at Trys Ceyl seem to have disappeared without trace, they say there, man and son, and I thought it worth leaving five men to see.”

“Well done, and I hope they find nothing so grave as we did by Emwy. Aught else observed by any of you?”

“Naught but quiet on Lenúalimʼs south,” said Sovrag. “Upriver…I wouldnʼt say. Itʼs eerie and quiet at Ynefel and all through that wood, and we sailed past it by broad day and set no foot on that shore. Ynefelʼs always chancy, and things come unhinged lately. A lot oddʼs come to us by rumor.”

“Odd things among the Elwynim?”

“I heard, leastwise third-hand, aye, mʼlord Prince, troubles and outlawry pourinʼ out of the fringes of Marna. Which of course we donʼt directly see, lord Prince, respecting as we do Maurylʼs dividing of the river. Except you call us north, of course.”

He chose not to challenge that. Or to say what his spies knew of Sovragʼs occasional goings and comings. “And by bridges to the south?”

“Bridges, aye, well — I donʼt know. We sailed that stretch out of Marna at night, but Iʼd swear there wasnʼt decks on ʼem. Looked open to the sky, to me, and showinʼ stars through, lord Prince.”

He looked at the frowning lord beside and behind Sovrag, whose lands were also on the river and bordering both Amefel and Olmern to the south. “Imor?”

“In the south,” said Umanon with a sour glance at Sovrag, “our only troubles are local, and, unlike some, we never fare north. We have had misgivings of Olmernʼs adventures, however limited, and I do not hesitate to say so.”

“Much of our trouble, too, is local,” said Heryn unasked. “Good my lords, look to your own rights and do as pleases you, but, as for me, I do nothing until the King responds to my inquiries. You should know this assemblage is without the Kingʼs knowledge or sanction.”

“But lawful.” Cefwyn held up a finger.

“But lawful,” Heryn admitted. “As in the matter of the Ivanim and the Olmernman, what my lord Prince wills becomes lawful.”

There was deathly silence in the hall. Heryn awaited some reaction to his brazen defiance. The barons and the Amefin lords alike waited to see what would result. Cefwyn let the silence go on. And on.

And suddenly in the outer hall was the tread of guards. Cefwyn leaned back then, a smile on his face, for the timing, thanks to Heryn, was far better than his precise order could have arranged. Heads began to turn.

It was Idrys, and Uwen, and following them, startlingly pale-skinned in black doublet and short black cloak, Tristen, escorted by the red-cloaked Guelen guard.

And the arms that Tristen wore on his shoulder for this oath-giving were arms unseen in the court of Ylesuin for more than two generations, the silver Tower of Ynefel in chief, above the eight-pointed Sihhë Star.

A page carried in and unfurled a banner, black and argent, bearing the same. A murmur of consternation erupted as Amefin townfolk and lords of Ylesuin together realized what banner they were seeing. The chamberlain pounded for order. Heryn had moved a step down from his entitled stance on the dais, and more slowly Cefwyn arose, walked down to the last step and held out his hand for Tristen.

Look neither left nor right, he had personally warned Tristen, and Tristenʼs pale eyes were locked now on his as a drowning manʼs on a sole promise of safety.

Their hands met, and Tristen, as he had been told, went to one knee on the step and pressed Cefwynʼs hand to his lips.

“What manner of sham is this?” Heryn cried aloud. “This man is a wandering idiot, a halfwit known to everyone in Henasʼamef!”

Cefwyn closed his hand on Tristenʼs and drew him to his feet, prepared to turn and deal with Heryn, but to his astonishment Tristen himself turned, fixed Heryn with a cold and clear-eyed stare, and swept it then on all the other lords.

A silence fell strangely in the hall, so that suddenly the chamberlainʼs staff rang loud in the silence.

“Tristen Lord Warden of Ynefel and Lord High Marshal of Althalen,” Cefwyn said into the silence. “Confirmed in those honors by me, to the lordships thereof and to all rights and inheritances in those lands to which he is as Mauryl Gestaurienʼs heir entitled.”

“No!” Heryn shouted above the instant tumult. “My lords, this wretch came to the gates babbling Maurylʼs name, and upon that sole evidence this whole invention is made! He is no son or heir or Mauryl Gestaurien! And he is no kindred of Elfwyn Sihhë, only some peasant halfwit who may or may not have been Maurylʼs servant — hence his gentlemanʼs speech! We all know that Mauryl had neither wife nor heir, legitimate or otherwise, unnatural that he was, — if in fact the old hermit at Ynefel was Mauryl Gestaurien. If, if, if, and upon those ifs this perhaps-servant of the man who was perhaps Gestaurien who was perhaps of Ynefel and perhaps the same Mauryl who was the ally of the Amefin is confirmed to equality with us, whose service to the Marhanen house is long and honorable. I protest it bitterly, my lord Prince! I do more than vehemently protest — I refuse to recognize this travesty on the honorable dead of this province, until I see more proof!”

The resultant murmur of voices quickly died in the crash of the chamberlainʼs staff. Cefwyn lifted a hand, unhurried, unmoved, satisfied in the attention.

“He was Maurylʼs, but no servant,” Cefwyn said. “And indeed the old man was Mauryl Gestaurien and indeed he had neither wife nor natural heir.”

There was silence, profound silence attendant on that announcement, and about the room no few of the hearers made pious signs that rapidly became a contagion. The patriarch of the local Quinalt made the same signs, and stared round-eyed and set-lipped at the proceeding. The rival and obscure Bryaltine abbot, close to the earth of Amefel, stood his ground among his supporters, a knot of three black robes in the shadows. The Quinalt patriarch looked to be gathering himself to speak.

“Please you, my lords,” Cefwyn said before that could happen. Least of all did he want the priests to fling pronouncements into the charged and anxious air. He caught the eye of the patriarch and glared a warning. The old man, who was, only yestereve, the recipient of a truly munificent Crown donative, closed his mouth and continued to glare. “My lords, Heryn has said there is no sufficient cause to have summoned you; in some quarters of Herynʼs domain, my motives are suspect, it seems — and surely he but reports the sentiment of his lords; but consider how you will fare, my lords, if bridges are being built in secret, and if the Elwynim do plan incursion — as certain ones would urge on me is the case. Mauryl has fallen, our borders to the west are undefended; and now assassins work to remove me from command and lately to defy Maurylʼs will and succession. Lord Tristen himself could tell you what he has seen. Question him if you will.”

Utter silence; Heryn first, Cefwyn thought, he will attack.

“How came Mauryl dead?” Sovrag leapt in first, daring where even Heryn had caution, and Tristen turned in that direction.

“The wind came,” Tristen said, “and the balconies fell. It was wicked, that wind, sir. — And Mauryl said I should follow the road. That was what I did. The road brought me here, and I came to Prince Cefwyn. And to master Emuin.”

There was silence still. Cefwyn realized his hand was clenched painfully. He relaxed it. The spell of Tristenʼs voice had fallen over the hall. He knew then that he had not misjudged Tristen, that Tristenʼs very artlessness had power; that there was ensorcellment in his look and in his voice that had stopped far less gentle men in their tracks; and most of all that Tristen would, if asked, tell exactly what he believed to be the truth, come hell, come brimstone, wizardry, or the Quinaltʼs blanched faces.

“Do you intend to send him to Ynefel, my lord Prince?” asked Pelumer suddenly. “Is he to take Maurylʼs place?”

“No,” said Tristen. That was all, in a silence made for a much longer remark.

Sovrag cleared his throat. “Thereʼs been no immediate trouble, I can say. Aye, we trade with Mauryl, aye, there being no Kingʼs law against it, Iʼll own to it, a boat to the landing by Ynefelʼs bridge, and by morning the goods are gone and thereʼll be a batch of simples and weight of gold in the boat, our own man never knowing how….”

There was a murmur, Umanon with his guard, but it died.

“And by morning, I say, the goodsʼd be gone, but now — now, I suppose, thereʼs an end of that trade.”

“Not Sihhë gold, of course,” Cefwyn said softly, the Crown claiming all such hoards, where found.

“No Sihhë gold, mʼlord Prince, no Star on ʼt. But fair weight of gold she were. And we give tax on it, as mʼlord Prince can know by the accounts, same as any trade: we writ ʼer down wiʼ the Kingʼs man. But I say this: there were peace with Mauryl and peace with the border yonder, only soʼs we stayed out of Marna Wood except as we was supplying him. I know men of Elwynor to try to come south and never come through. Not a year gone, some of mine got greedy and came off the boat and tried the old manʼs gate, but no one that went in came out — and I got the word of the man that stayed wiʼ the boat that there was shrieking and screaming aplenty in the keep, fit to chill his blood. But no harm come to him, and he fell into a sleep as always and waked wiʼ the goods gone, and the gold and the simples as always in the boat with him. The men that left that boat never come back. I can swear to ye, and so would that man swear, that that were Mauryl indeed, that old man in Ynefel. And I say, too, Maurylʼs demand of flour and oil and all did double this spring, to the wonder of us all.”

A murmur went through the hall, at that. Cefwyn paid sharp attention, thinking to himself that here was a source very few consulted — a source on that river that saw more than he admitted to seeing, because he was most often breaking the Kingʼs law and hedging on breaking Maurylʼs partition of the river into two parts eighty years ago — north for Elwynorʼs commerce, and south for Ylesuinʼs, to the profit of Olmern and Imor.

“Thank you, mʼlord of Olmern,” Cefwyn said. “And, Tristen?”

“My lord?”

“Will you offer peace to all the lords assembled, for Ynefel and Althalen?”

“Most gladly, sir.”

“And be a loyal subject of the Marhanen Crown?”

“Yes, mʼlord Prince. Most gladly.”

“And a pious subject of His Majesty?”

“Most gladly, mʼlord Prince.”

It was very quiet, for a questioning of rite and ritual. It was more quiet than attended a royal heirʼs investiture, he could attest to that; more quiet, more sobriety, and more careful attention to implications of words the lords all, at one time or another, memorized and mouthed, believing in the oath, it might be, but never understanding as applicable to themselves the prohibition against sorcery.

A second kneeling, a second impression of Tristenʼs lips against his hand and placing of hands within hands: he raised Tristen up, set a brotherly kiss on his cheek, and the whole hall breathed with one breath.

There was a move at his left then, and he glanced aside in alarm, recoiled a step sideways as Heryn cast himself to his knees at his feet — his first thought was for the hands, a weapon, but the hands were empty, and there were Guelen all about as alarmed as he, whose hands were on weapons. Pikes had half-lowered.

“My lord Prince,” Heryn said in the dying murmur of alarm. “I beg forgiveness of you and of him. I thought — I most earnestly thought this was a sham meant against this hall. Gods witness I was wrong. I am a loyal man to the King, and to his sons. Gracious Highness, forgive my suspicion.”

“It is late for that.”

“I withdraw my protests, and will swear so.”

“I do not withdraw my Guelen, and will swear so.”

“I must bear that, then,” Heryn said, and when sarcasm might have prevailed, there was no apparent edge to his voice, only anguish.

Something must be done with him; the whole hall waited, anxious, skeptical of Heryn alike, perhaps embarrassed in Herynʼs fall from dignity, perhaps thinking of their own weapons: Cefwyn knew the volatility of the region all too well; but he considered rejecting Heryn and his offer, and his tax records, a moment or two longer than he might ordinarily contemplate a move to fracture the peace.

But after such a delay, enough to make Herynʼs face go to pallor, he beckoned the man to rise, and, still frowning, gave him the formal embrace courtesy and custom demanded after such an accepted capitulation.

Still there was a cold feeling next his heart while Heryn touched him. He was very glad of the leather armor he wore, and he said to himself angrily that he had indeed been in bed with but two of the Aswydd whores, and them less shameless.

He set Heryn back coldly and turned his shoulder to him as other lords and their adherents came to the steps, quick to protest their support in more dignified terms than Herynʼs example. Even dour Cevulirn came and offered more than ritual support against, Cevulirn said, the rumors of bridge-building.

Came, too, one town official of Henasʼamef, creaking with age, who seized Tristenʼs hand, to Tristenʼs clear astonishment, and knelt and kissed it, tears running down his face.

“Mʼlord Sihhë,” the man hailed him. “We believe in ye.”

Mark that for remembrance, Cefwyn thought angrily, wondering at the manʼs brazen act; and then saw Tristenʼs look, which was touched by the gesture and was completely bewildered as the old manʼs tears wet his hand.

Shame reproved him then, as he saw that there was no politicking at all in the old manʼs tears and trembling. It was no treason, only an old man who had waited a long time to see what he was willing to agree the old man had indeed seen — and a better age for the folk of Amefel and Elwynor if it were true and accepted by the Marhanen: that was what he had held out to the population of Amefel. He saw it clearly now. The frail old official knelt and kissed his hand, too, and he helped the man up, and, more, embraced him. He was frightened — disturbed to the heart — by his own jealous impulses.

He knew his grandfatherʼs mind, the quick suspicion, the angers, the jealousy with which the old man had brought up his two sons — the same jealousy that worked within him and within all the Marhanens. It was their curse. It was their besetting fault. He kissed the old man on the cheek, in a coldhearted demonstration of Marhanen recognition of the native Amefin.

He was Marhanen. He couldnʼt help the politicking. It, along with temper, ran in the blood.

All about him after that was tumult. A press of Amefin bodies unnerved his guards. He, with Tristen, received the respects of Amefin who never before this would have dared approach the Prince of Ylesuin.

The hour was his. He had made peace in his district. A Sihhë banner was on display in a hall where it had once hung as sovereign, now grouped with the banners of Ylesuin. A Sihhë, aetheling in the minds of the people, had sworn fealty and allegiance to the Marhanen prince and been recognized and legitimized — a prince himself: that went with it. The prophecy on which Elwynor should reunite with Amefel — was fulfilled, but not as the Regents of Elwynor would have it.

Servants were carrying in the tables, meanwhile. Annas was in charge. Annas could read the subtleties of a situation the way master Tamurin could read accounts, and knew when to make distraction, and when to make it loud and urgent.

There was venison, there was pork, there was rabbit and there were partridge pies, a specialty of the region. There were pitchers of wine, wheels of white and yellow cheese, white bread and black. Plates whisked off and onto tables with the precision of weapons-drill, and there was an endless succession of courses, a loaf of eggs-in-sausage, a course of roast veal and another of fish, delivered not alone to the huge hall, but to the adjacent Zeide weapons-court, where the gentry of Henasʼamef, in all their finery, had had the princeʼs invitation to the tables set up since evening.

There were Guelen guards at every entry, and weapons not in urgent display, but the guards were sober, watchful, and well convinced every potential assassin or hirer of assassins among the Amefin was likely a guest tonight in hall or out in the common court. But festivities and food abounded in the courtyards as well as in the hall, not to mention the kettles of stew set up in the lower town court, offering supper to any bringer of a bowl and supper and a trencher of bread to those who had none, on the princeʼs largesse.

Pay due courtesy to the guards, weary and sleepless as they had already been: Idrys had admonished them, to a man, on the princeʼs orders, that there were to be no complaints of pushing, no press with pikes or weapons, no hesitation if needed, but no temptation of Amefin tempers. And cheer spread throughout the Zeideʼs courts, audible through the windows above the tumult inside: there were cheers raised, there were toasts, there was moderate tipsiness, but only once so far was there a breach of the peace, and that over a young damsel of the town and a trio of suitors. There might have been a resort to the Kingʼs law. There might have been arrests.

But, informed of the cause, Cefwyn chose not to notice it, nor to have the guards acknowledge seeing it. He had Heryn on one side and Umanon on the other, with Sovrag and Pelumer within easy distance, Cevulirn and Tristen out of easy speaking range at the high table.

He also had Idrys at his back, constantly, as Uwen held anxious watch at Tristenʼs, and other lordsʼ men hovered in similar fashion. If there was to be amanita in the sauce or a knife drawn at table, there was at least sufficient force to be sure of revenge. But Heryn had no Amefin, but a Guelen man to watch his back, and it might be well, Cefwyn thought, that Heryn had that for his own protection. Before he had even come down to hall to hear Herynʼs protestations of undying affection, he had set the Guelen servants free to gossip to their Amefin counterparts of Herynʼs account books, a dispensation of gossip loosed with the same mindful intent with which he would have signed a death warrant.

And if there was tonight any anxiousness in Henasʼamef, particularly in that courtyard, besides the raising of a Sihhë standard contrary to the Kingʼs law, it surely revolved around those books. Two messages thus far had come to him from the Zeide doors, stating that the sender had information on usury, if the prince would send messengers to this appointment and that on the morrow.

The prince tucked the small missives in his shirt and measured his wine consumption, while Heryn drank far too much and Umanon far too little to be pleasant.

Sovrag leaned up the table, jeopardizing a goblet. “Mʼlord Prince! Dʼ the Elwynim know about this Sihhë lad?”

“I wager they will,” he called back.

“Ye wisht ʼem tʼ know, mʼlord? We can ʼcomplish that by morninʼ, an ye will.”

“I think we can wait, mʼlord Sovrag, on the ordinary flow of gossip. On the other hand—” A thought came to him, not a new thought, but new to the moment.

“Eh?” A page was serving sweetmeats. Sovragʼs fist seized a full share and two, and Sovrag never moved from staring at him. “Eh, mʼlord?”

“Bridges! Iʼd know for certain about those bridges!”

“Along the Elwynim reach, me lord?”

“Oh, aye, on the Elwynim reach. No, I was asking for the Arachimʼs bridges! Iʼd know if thereʼs preparation for decking — such as could be brought up quickly, laid on or taken off.”

Sovrag grinned. “Well, I passed right under Emwyʼs, and saw nothing — but, then I wasnʼt looking for decking stowed out of sight. I could have a boat have a look there and on upstream, mʼlord Prince, if you was to promise ʼem lads a sovereign.”

“You have it,” he said, to the scandal of lord Umanon, past whom the unlordly barter flowed. “Two sovereigns if they donʼt tell the Elwynim!”

Sovrag pounded the table and laughed aloud. “Ye got ʼer, mʼlord, ye got ʼer! Brigoth!” He summoned his man close, seized him by the front of his doublet to bring him closer, and shouted into his ear something about a boat and launching by moonset.

“Idrys,” Cefwyn said, and Idrys leaned into range. “Two sovereigns.”

“Yes, Your Highness.” The stress on his title said what Umanonʼs silent outrage said, that the Prince of Ylesuin had no need to haggle with a subject lord, or to pay him for his services. But the two sovereigns would find their way to Sovragʼs purse, he was well certain, and he by the gods liked a lord who for once put a simple price on his work.

“He seems a pleasant enough witchling!” Sovrag said next. “He donʼt look more ʼn a lad.”

“Heʼs honest,” Cefwyn said back, knowing the voices were carrying. “And fair-minded.”

“Mauryl always dealt fair,” Sovrag said. “If he come by Maurylʼs will, and if the gold from that trade be done, then what he says is so, the old manʼs gone. So say I. And him sworn tʼ you, me lord, and to the King?”

“By his oath, sir, yes.”

“Atʼs a neat trick,” Sovrag said, at which there were several shocked faces. And then seized a page. “Pour for the Sihhë lord,” Sovrag said. “A health for His Lordship of the Sihhë!”

The page ran to do as he was bidden, by a man of Sovragʼs size. Lie down with hounds, Cefwyn said to himself, sorry now heʼd set the man in motion, but, refusing to be set aback by the riverlordʼs raucous good will, he rose himself and proposed the health, of the King first, of the company second, of the Sihhë lord third.

Annas himself poured Sovragʼs cup full, one of the big ones, at each toast, and at each health, after his princeʼs own lengthy praise of the King, of the company, and of Maurylʼs unexpected heir, Sovrag drained his cup to the dregs.

Cefwyn proposed the health of their Amefin hosts, at last, not mentioning Heryn, who doubtless smoldered in indignation.

Which saved him the decision, finally, whether to toast Heryn last, for Sovrag collapsed off the bench, and he had drunk every toast, himself.

But started with fewer. Which, he heard remarked as the banquet dwindled down to the determined drinkers, might well become legend, how Prince Cefwyn, standing, had drunk Sovrag of the Olmernmen under the table.

It was not at all the report he wished his royal father to receive.

But the evening, he judged, when he declared the lords all duly welcomed, was otherwise a success.

Still, afterward, walking up the stairs to his apartment with Tristen at his side and Idrys and Uwen Lewenʼs-son at his back, he could not shake the conviction that the evening had not gone quite as well as he would have wished, and that the lords liked each other no better than they had in the beginning.

Heryn was the poison, he said to himself. Heryn had no reason to be pleased with the evening, far less reason to be pleased with Tristenʼs appearance under forbidden arms and, what had surely galled Heryn, Tristenʼs health being drunk quite willingly by the other lords.

And least of all could Heryn be happy in the slights heaped on him by the prince under his roof and in the failure of the southern lords, especially the lesser lords of Amefel, traditionally fractious against the Marhanen, to rise in support of his challenge. That such a man as Heryn had accepted the humiliation of apology was not incredible after the rest of Herynʼs performance; the sincerity of it, however, was far from credible, and he felt uneasy even with the guards around. He asked himself how he had fallen into the trap of accepting Herynʼs public contrition, or how he had gone from being certain he wished to be rid of Heryn to envisioning ways to keep Heryn, momentarily forgetting his sins of taxation, in favor of the functions Heryn and his predecessors had very aptly performed for the Marhanen, namely keeping a key and very troublesome province quiet. Heryn knew the Amefin rebels well enough to prevent any untimely rising. In point of fact, Heryn might have no interest whatever in rebellion against the whole Marhanen line. It was most particularly Cefwyn Marhanen that Heryn wished dead: Cefwyn who was onto his tricks, Cefwyn who had probed into his books, Cefwyn who would be far too active and aggressive a Marhanen king. If Efanor became King, Efanor, who hated the borderlands, would never visit here, and that would suit Heryn Aswydd well. As their royal father had suited the Aswydds — until he produced an heir perhaps too forward in his opinions and too public in his excesses, an heir whose edges King Ináreddrin wished to blunt against provincial obduracy and the facts of rule in an unwilling and witch-haunted border district.

But Heryn was (postponing the decision on Herynʼs fate, at least) safely under guard. His sisters, ordinarily the bright moths to lordly flame, had flittered away to guarded quarters and lordly virtue was safe under this roof tonight, at least from the Aswyddim.

They reached the crest of the stairs, the safe territory, the vast torchlit hall stretching away into intermittent darkness. They walked together in separate silences until the guard which escorted Tristen necessarily parted company from that which stayed about him, going to the opposite side of the hall.

Then he realized how very absorbed in his own thoughts he had been, and looked up to bid Tristen good night, to — as he realized he should — tell him his hours of study with Annas had done well for him.

But he had waited an instant too long. Tristen had his back to him now, and walked on with Uwen and his escort, head bowed, a tall, formidable shape, did one not know how gentle-spirited — black sparked with silver, under the dim light of the wall-sconces, which seemed far too grim a color for their childlike guest.

So somber Tristen seemed, so strangely sad and defenseless in that company of soldiers, though he towered over the most of them.

Elfwyn, the thought came unbidden, and a chill came over him. Feckless, murdered Sihhë king.

Elfwyn would not even fight for his own life, at the last. He would not leave his hall or his studies until the Marhanen soldiers came for him, to bring him out to die. Elfwyn had cared only for his books, and they had burned those with Althalen.

So, so much knowledge and lore of the Sihhë had been lost there.

He had launched war — or peace — this night. He had raised the standard his grandfather and his father alike had banned for fear of Elwynim pretenders.

But he had granted what he had granted to Tristen even to the good of the Elwynim. In Tristen, in this sonless dwindling of the Regentsʼ line in Elwynor, he had a chance for peace and resolution of the old dispute, and Mauryl had sent it to him, perhaps a test of Ylesuinʼs willingness for peace — and a test of his kingship, what he would be, what he might be, if he could settle that old dispute and make a lasting peace with the realm of Elwynor — itself containing six provinces — that had once, with Ylesuin, Amefel, Marna, and lands west and south, constituted the Sihhë domains.

The chained men at his door jarred his muddled thoughts: the Olmern lad and the Ivanim were still on watch. He saw the boyʼs eyes glassy in the glare of candles.

He stopped.

“Is this man ill?”

The Ivanim lordling maintained grim silence. The boy said, “No, Your Highness.”

He looked to the Guelen sergeant. “Change guard, sergeant. Idrys has, I presume, given you my conditions to them?”

“Yes, my lord Prince.”

“Theyʼre to receive the same standard fare and the same watches as your own. Do gently to them if they are gentle men with each other. If one kills the other, report it to me. They know the consequence.”

“Highness.”

Cefwyn went into his apartment, seeking the warmth of his own fire. He wrapped his arms close about his sides and stood with head bowed, suddenly feeling the weight of the metal-studded leather. His joints ached.

“Mʼlord.”

Idrys startled him. He had not known Idrys had come in yet.

“Guards are to remain as set, mʼlord Prince?”

“Gods, yes, they remain.”

“Yes, my lord Prince.”

Idrys left him, seeming satisfied. Cefwyn walked into the other room, his bedchamber, his eyes automatically searching the shadows for ambush. It was lifelong habit. He expected to die by assassination — someday. It was the common fate in his house. He did not fear the shadows — as his grandfather had and his father did. He needed no candles. He had no faith in the Quinalt or in candles blessed by priests. It was his inherited nature, perhaps, to grow gloomy and fatalistic.

But he had perhaps solved Maurylʼs riddle, this Shaping the wizard had cast on the Marhanen doorstep. He was the third generation after Althalen, the generation in which all curses and chances, by all the accounts, ultimately came home. He was the King-to-be of Ylesuin. And Tristen — Tristen could become the surety the Marhanen King had on this border, perhaps a provincial lord, even a tributary king, himself, over a diminished realm, in which men of the east would not be subordinate to Sihhë lords or Sihhë kings. It was peace he had begun to build, it was a settlement of ancient disputes. It was the dream of a kingdom without the need to keep half its peasants constantly under arms, or with weapons within reach; a kingdom without the need to dread their own western provinces as a breeding-place of assassins. He had seen enough of assassins, attended enough executions, seen enough funerals.

And if his father the King had meant a year here to blunt his heirʼs untried edges, then his father equally well might know that granting him an independent command might not bring the two of them into congruency of thought. He grew less, rather than more, like his father. He tinkered with mercy. He temporized with witches. He — gods, only to think of it now as done — had raised the forbidden standard in the sight of the Quinalt and the southern lords.

He could hear his brother say, Father, heʼs lost his wits. Heʼs bewitched.

But he could by no means hear his brother say, Father, send me to set things right. Efanor had no liking for Amefel or long discomfort.

Efanor, younger brother, was sitting well-appointed to Llymaryn, a province where no hint of rebellion stirred the leaves of summer, where vineyards thrived, where pious Quinalt orthodoxy ruled the land and no one had contrary or troubling thoughts. Conscience sat easy on Llymaryn, in the holy heart of a people of entirely Guelen descent, a land without foreign borders to ward, a district where the lords vied with each other only in complimenting the Kingʼs younger son, in telling him he was right, and good, and just, and that divine justice approved him.

Efanor spent his year of administrative trial in paradise, praised and pampered — and probably still virgin: the Quinalt ruled Llymaryn, and lately it seemed to rule Efanorʼs every thought.

He stripped off the red doublet and dropped it — not on the floor: he had more regard of the pages who likewise suffered this crucible of his heirship, lads who grew wary, and thin about the cheeks, and learned to go in pairs. “Boy!” he shouted, and a page, sleeping on the bench, leapt up and rushed to catch the garment. And his shirt, after.

Idrys came in. He heard the outer door shut and heard Idrys stirring about in the other room — heard Idrys talking to one of the pages, probably filling his head with instructions to watch the princeʼs guest.

Idrys did not approve what he had done. But Idrys was not his fatherʼs man. He began to believe that. Idrys had gone very far with him tonight, across a boundary of decision that, now, either admitted them to negotiation with the Elwynim, or committed them if not to war, at least to a period of very unsettled peace. He had the forces now to make the point. He had demonstrated he could summon them. He had demonstrated his willingness to do new things.

He would be interested to see what Sovragʼs lads turned up, whether there were, as he feared, bridges built or reinforced, ready to receive decking which could be brought up very quickly, and whether the Elwynim were in fact preparing for war, behind the cover of this bride-offering.

He would, he resolved, see whether the bride was still waiting, or what Elwynorʼs Regent would do, once he knew the Sihhë King-to-Be was in Marhanen hands.