C. J. Cherryh - Fortress 05 (15 page)

He had lied the third time. Everything had, on the surface, gone well and smoothly. He had only to wear his second-best clothes and have supper with his father, and smile at the right times and not the wrong ones when they went in public. But his heart kicked like a hare in a trap. Was it tonight, not tomorrow, that he should tell his father the truth?

It had no certain feeling, the way his luck ran now.

Paisi, oh, Paisi
, he thought.
Be careful. Be ever so careful
.

It might still be my mother’s working.

viii

IF PAISI HAD BEEN WITH HIM AS SUNDOWN CAME, HE

WOULD HAVE LAID OUT all the right clothes for the dinner. He would have called for a bath well in advance and had the house servants carry the water up, and Otter and Paisi would have dressed in good order. But Paisi was somewhere on the road south now, perhaps approaching some village, or at very least one of the windbreak shelters they had used on their way, with a good stone wall for protection and a place for lawful fires.

So as the day dimmed in the windows, Otter did as Paisi would have done and laid his second-best out on the bed. He had no idea how to get a bath, which required informing someone: he had no idea who that person was.

He did know the source of drinking water, however, down by the inner well, where the whole Guelesfort got its water from a spring unstoppable by drought or hostile attack. It was cold as old sin when it came out, that was what Paisi had said, and miserable for washing, but it would serve in present circumstances. Otter carried it upstairs in the drinking pitcher, and none of the servants, lowest of the low, asked him his business.

He warmed a little water in the fireplace, for which wood was running somewhat low, and he used the washing basin for a bath, there on the warm hearthstones. He took pains with his appearance as he dressed, and found himself, as far as he could tell, acceptable.

He had put the basket of food by the hearthside, to burn before morning, as Efanor’s little scroll informed him he should do. He had put the amulet in the clothespress in one of his gloves, where it would rest, safe from prying servants and accidents.

And he had on his fine dark brown, modest and plain, but very, very kind to clean skin. He thought he must look very fine, not as showy as he was sure Aewyn would appear tonight, let alone their father and the queen. But he was ready. His hair was combed. His linen was spotless. He hoped he would find the courage he needed.

He hoped Aewyn was speaking to him and that he could signal the need to talk to him in private, when he could make peace.

He had been alone since dawn, and trembled at the thought of trying to confess his sins tonight, at least to Aewyn, as quietly as he could, and maybe, if he could possibly catch the king in private and without servants or guards—maybe he should just take the chance instead of waiting until tomorrow.

Tonight was sure—well, almost sure. Tomorrow—he had no notion whether he would have a chance then, either: it was only Aewyn and his mother, so far as he knew, who could get to him completely in private.

But there was still Aewyn to face. And that came first.

He left his rooms at the very edge of dusk and went down the hall and across the landing of the grand stairs, a long walk to the opposite wing that the royal apartments occupied. The guards here all knew him, and ignored him as someone who had leave to come and go, and the fact that the guards were still at Aewyn’s door informed him that Aewyn had not yet gone to his father’s chambers. He saw that with a sudden rush of hope.

The guards had to announce him: they did that when he simply appeared at the door and waited, and it was no delay at all before they let him in.

“There you are!” Aewyn said with a frown. “
Where
have you been?”

“I—” he began, then lost the thread of everything.

“I tried to find you early this morning, and I couldn’t, so I took a sack of apples from the kitchen storeroom, and I took them down and paid the stableboy to lay them out tomorrow. Then the tailor showed up, and Master Armorer, and that was hours of standing.”

Aewyn’s face grew worried, then, reflecting his. “Is something wrong? Where have you
been
all day?”

Otter lowered his voice to its faintest. “In my rooms. I had to send Paisi home, on my horse.”

“Why?” Aewyn asked, hardly lowering his voice at all, then seized him by the arm and led him over near the tall diamond windows where there was a modicum of privacy from the servants. “Why?

What happened?”

How did he know about Gran? That was the burning question.

And he chose not to lie—but not to tell everything until Aewyn thought to ask him.

“Gran’s taken ill. And we didn’t count on the storms being so bad and there might not be enough wood small enough for her to carry, and sometimes the shed door freezes up with ice, so you have to take an axe to get the ice clear.”

“So Paisi left, and you helped him?” Aewyn’s eyes were wide. “I didn’t see you down at the stable when I was there.”

“We were out before it was more than half-light, and I rode and Paisi walked as far as the gate. We found merchants for him to travel with, so he’s safe. But I had to lie to the gate wardens up and down, and then the stablemaster’s boy, and then to your uncle…”

“To Uncle Efanor? How did
he
get into it?”

“He stopped me in the hall to tell me how to behave in Festival, and to tell me to come to dinner tonight.”

“But you’re completely by yourself now! Who helped you?”

“I had a bath, and I always dressed myself. And I had already gotten food for supper, except His Highness said I was to come to dinner.”

“Well, but you’re all alone! You can’t be by yourself. Come stay with me tonight!”

“I can’t. They’ll know, and they could still catch Paisi if they know too soon.” He hadn’t made up his mind, but all of a sudden what he told Paisi he would do seemed the best course. “I have to pretend he’s still here at least until tomorrow; then they won’t bother to chase him.”

“You think they
would
chase him?”

There was the hardest part, the part he hoped would get by. “We aren’t supposed to know about Gran, and we do, by a way that we’re not supposed to, and if we weren’t supposed to know, then we weren’t supposed to go, either, were we?”

“How
did
you know?” Aewyn asked, and Otter took a deep breath and told the truth:

“Dreams. We both had the same dream, and Gran can Send a dream if she has to. She needs us. And Paisi had to go, and we can’t take a chance of Paisi getting caught. He has to get through.”

“But he
is
coming back, isn’t he?”

“He will, as soon as he can. It’s three days to get there. Longer, with the weather. And he won’t try to come back until it’s safe on the roads. I told him not to try. But I’ll tell His Majesty tomorrow, after Fast Day, after Paisi’s had time enough to get clear away.

And I’ll do my best to explain everything. I hope His Majesty may forgive me.”

“He won’t be angry.”

“I hope he won’t be. I was so scared your uncle knew—”

“Well, but he doesn’t, then, does he?” Aewyn loved plots above all things: his eyes sparkled. “And if you don’t have anybody to do for you, well, I can send you gifts, can’t I?”

“Can you send a whole bath?”

Aewyn laughed. “I can! I shall! And with the family dinner tonight, you won’t starve.”

“So. See?” He feigned complete confidence. “It’s all perfectly fine.

And I’ll confess what I did, when I have to. But maybe nobody will ever notice Paisi isn’t here!”

Aewyn’s eyes fairly danced. “
How
did you get away with the horse?”

“I asked the stableboy to saddle him.”

“And just took him out?”

“Paisi got breakfast from the kitchen, and I got Feiny out. We rode down to the gate before anybody was much on the streets, found some merchants who wanted a guard, and there we were.

They promised to feed Paisi and Feiny both until they reach the crossing. And I sent Feiny out in all his gear, so he’ll be warm enough, especially with the traders’ mules and enough to eat.”

“That’s clever!”

“And I still have Paisi’s horse, if I need him.”

“He’s a piebald.”

“He has all his legs, last I saw.”

Aewyn laughed. “Well, he can’t keep up with mine. We’ll tell Papa what’s happened and get you another horse.”

“I can’t feed the one I have!”

Aewyn took on a quizzical expression. “The boy will feed him. He always does.”

“But at Gran’s… Gran can’t feed a horse. We’ll have to give Feiny and Tammis back when I go home for good and all.”

“You’re not going home!”

“I don’t know. I suppose that depends on whether your father sends me home for stealing Feiny.”

“He won’t! You’ll be here forever.”

Aewyn clearly had his mind made up on the point, and it was good to hear, but equally clearly, it was only Aewyn’s opinion, not the king’s.

“I hope to be here,” Otter said. He wasn’t sure about wanting it through spring planting, when Gran needed him, and once he’d said it the very ground under him felt shaky, as if nothing before him was the same as before. “I don’t know where I’ll be once the king finds out.”

“I’ll go with you to tell him.”

“After Fast Day. To give Paisi time enough. If soldiers came after him, I don’t know what he might do.”

“After Fast Day,” Aewyn said. “So we should go to dinner now.

And we’ll have our secret.”

ix

OTTER HAD ONLY ONCE STOOD IN THE KING’S PRIVATE

CHAMBERS, AND HAD NO idea where he was to go, beyond the little room he knew, but Aewyn knew the way to the inner halls, quite confidently. He marched them past all the guards, all the servants, arm in arm, at the last, a terrifying lack of manners, right into the room set for family dining.

The king was there, and they disentangled themselves and bowed respectfully and properly—bowed, likewise to the queen, Ninévrisë.

Aewyn came to her for a kiss on the cheek.

“Mama,” he said, and returned her embrace.

Then Ninévrisë reached out a hand toward Otter, too, beckoning insistently. “Come,” she said, “come here, young man.”

Otter advanced ever so cautiously, his heart thumping. His vision was all of white and gold, beautiful furnishings, beautiful table, beautiful pale blue gown and a nearer and nearer vision of dark hair and a golden circlet, with the most luminous violet eyes gazing right at his. He was caught, snared, drawn forward, constrained to offer a hand, and to touch and be touched.

“Welcome,” the queen said, when he bowed and looked up.

“Welcome, Otter.”

They said the queen had been with his mother the hour he was born. They said the queen had held him in her arms. He had never been able to grasp it for the truth—that she could be so kind to her husband’s bastard. He was utterly dismayed when she drew him forward and kissed him lightly on the cheek, in the way gentlefolk kinsmen did.

“Your Majesty,” he murmured. She was that. She was a reigning queen in all but name, in her own kingdom of Elwynor. And wizardry and witchery were not at all dead in Elwynor: her title, Regent of Elwynor, held place for the return of a Sihhë king. The Gift, Gran had told him, ran as strong in that line as it did through the Aswydds. He felt it tingle through her fingers, through the touch of her lips, so potent for the instant that it sparked through his bones and left him addle-witted and dazed, staring at her.

“Come, oh, come,” Aewyn said impatiently, dragging him by the arm, past Prince Efanor, and past the king himself, to claim a seat beside him at table, standing. They were only Aewyn, and Efanor, and the king and queen, and it was impossible to think only five people could eat at that great table, with all those plates and cups.

There was holiday greenery, just as Aewyn had said, and birds served under their feathers, and pies, stacks of pies. It hardly seemed so grim, the Quinalt holy day, as it had sounded in Efanor’s little list of instructions.

King Cefwyn pronounced the prayer: “Gods grant us peace, prosperity, and our heart’s desire. The gods look down on us and bless us all.”

“So be it,” Efanor said quietly, “and bless them that serve and them that guard.”

“So be it,” the queen said.

“So be it,” Aewyn said, and dug his elbows into Otter’s ribs.

“So be it,” Otter breathed hastily, and everyone smiled and looked pleased with the occasion, while the whole room and its colors and smells seemed a haze around him. For an instant all he could think of was how to traverse the length of that table and speak to the man who had fathered him. He had no idea now what he would say or where he would start once he did start to explain; but now he remembered how he had lied to Efanor, who had been nothing but kind to him. The queen had just gone out of her way to be kind. And Aewyn—Aewyn, who was entitled to everything by right—he had involved Aewyn, delaying telling him what Aewyn now knew, and now expecting his help. He sat in the heart of the family, Aewyn most of all having brought him here. Aewyn and his mother had each had more than a slight choice about welcoming him under this roof. Aewyn had poured out his affection and his wealth and his kinship on him as thoughtlessly, as generously as breathing. And the queen, who most of all had every right to wish he never existed—he still felt the tingle of her lips touching his cheek and the warmth of her hand.

No group of people in his life had ever had so much cause to wish he had never been born, and no one had ever been so generous toward him, except Gran and Paisi. What had he done to deserve such trust, and what did he do to repay it but a piece of mischief growing worse by the hour: it was what Paisi had said—it was not the obvious thing that was the crime: it was not taking Feiny; it was the Sending and the Seeing, right in the midst of their holy days.

Aewyn was not distressed, he told himself, over the soup. Aewyn would choose the best time, and broach the matter, and all he had to do was bow his head, beg forgiveness, and promise never, ever to cause any difficulty in the house again.