Janessa turned away feeling relief wash over her as she recognised Graye’s delicate features beneath the slight gold mask she wore over her eyes. About to accept gratefully, she checked herself.
Don’t seem too eager. This is all a game. Neither offend nor flatter; that is the way of kings and queens.
‘As you can see, I am speaking with the baroness.’
‘I’m afraid the Lord Governor was most insistent,’ Graye quickly replied. ‘There are grave matters in Coppergate which, in the absence of the king, require your royal attention. And he is unable to remain for long at the Feast.’
‘Very well,’ said Janessa, trying to affect the suitable level of disappointment. ‘If you would excuse me, Baroness. Leon.’ She inclined her head to each, and was rewarded with a curtsy and a bow, though Isabelle looked as though she had just sipped from a wine glass and tasted horse pissle.
Graye led them both off through the crowd, with Janessa nodding graciously to everyone she passed, until they found a shadowy alcove at the edge of the hall.
‘Where have you been?’ Janessa said admonishingly, though she couldn’t help but feel grateful.
‘You’re not the only one who needs to find a husband,’ Graye replied with a grin, her perfect teeth almost dazzling in the torchlight.
‘Young Leon Magrida’s evidently free. Soon to be Baron of all Dreldun.’
‘No thanks,’ said Graye, her mouth twisting in disgust. ‘I’ve heard he’s a nasty little toad, just like his mother. And you’re welcome, by the way. I could have just left you in their clutches.’
Janessa smiled her thanks. ‘Where would I be without you to come and rescue me?’
‘Betrothed to some northern weasel, no doubt. And you’ll get no more help from me until you admit how indispensable I am.’
‘Well … you’re fairly good for picking out shoes. Although the heels on these did turn out to be too high, as I predicted.’ She hiked up her skirt to exhibit her impractical footwear.
A shadow fell over them both, and Graye looked up with a guilty expression.
‘Lower your dress, majesty,’ came Odaka Du’ur’s deep whisper.
Janessa quickly released her skirts and composed herself before turning to face the regent.
‘I was merely—’
‘Never mind what you were “merely” about to do. There are people you must meet. Gossiping with your lady in waiting is not the reason you are here.’
Clearly not – being sold at market is the reason I am here.
‘Then let us proceed,’ Janessa replied, lifting her chin and stepping from the privacy of the alcove and into the crowd.
She couldn’t tell for how long she was exhibited before the various nobles of the Free States as Odaka made introductions and she smiled dutifully, doing her best with the mindless small talk. Most of the governing dukes and barons of the Free States were away north with her father, but they had sent their envoys. Magistrates, stewards and ministers were paraded in front of her, as well as the High Abbot of Ironhold, who, she noted, had yellow bruises about what could be seen of his face and a bandage covering one hand. If a lord should be absent, his wife or one of their offspring was present in his stead. Janessa tried to remember all their names, but there were simply too many. Only those with particularly offensive breath or unpleasant facial features made a lasting impression; like Judge Burtleby’s black teeth, or Lady Morgana Hirch’s enormous nostrils.
Just when Janessa thought she could take no more, Odaka guided her towards a tall, haughty, but handsome-looking man in his early twenties, and made his introduction. ‘Lord Raelan Logar, son of Bannon Logar, Duke of Valdor and Protector of the North.’
Janessa inclined her head as she had so many times already, smiling the necessary smile and hoping this would be the last.
‘Lord Raelan. It is a pleasure. I know our fathers think very highly of one another.’ Unlike most of the platitudes she’d uttered tonight, at least this one was true.
‘Indeed,’ Raelan replied. ‘I only hope they return to us safe and victorious.’
Janessa tensed at the sudden reminder that her father was in mortal danger. ‘We can but hope.’
‘I only wish I could be by his side – but here I am.’ Though his expression was composed his tone spoke accusation. Did he think her responsible for his presence at court? That she’d requested he abandon his father to the front that they might be forced together like stallion and mare in the rutting season?
‘I can assure you, Lord Raelan, that I feel the same.’
‘I’m sure.’ He glanced around the dining hall as though seeking a more interesting companion.
She was leaning in closer, shame and anger rising within her, desperate to tell him she hated this mummers’ farce as much as he did, when the orchestra unleashed a raucous tune. Whatever she
might
have said was drowned in a blaring torrent of music. Odaka leaned towards them.
‘The dance begins, my lord,’ he said to Raelan. ‘Perhaps you might offer her majesty your hand?’
Raelan inclined his head very slightly and offered his hand, as was tradition.
Janessa glanced around in panic. She wanted to refuse, but her conversation with Raelan had already turned heads and they were being watched by a score of courtiers. To refuse him now would only make her look scornful.
Reluctantly, she accepted his proffered hand.
He led her to the centre of the room where perhaps a dozen courtiers had assumed their positions: men on one side, ladies on the other. Someone in the surrounding crowd clapped as a gleeful audience gathered and Janessa could only look around in panic at the prospect of making a spectacle of herself.
Desperately she tried to recall the steps. She had been trained in courtly manners, and dance was one of the many things she’d been forced to learn, but she had completely forgotten the type of dance that went with this tune; even what the first step was.
The row of men bowed as one to the ladies before them. The ladies bowed in their turn, and Janessa managed to join them. With that one simple gesture it all seemed to come back to her.
Both rows advanced, touching their raised right hands and turning in unison, weaving in and out in time to the rhythmic beat of the music. Occasionally partners would switch, and she’d find herself with another of the young dancers who would invariably look at her in wide-eyed fear. But she always came back to Raelan. It didn’t take her long to relax into the repetitive steps and she was even starting to enjoy herself.
‘You dance well,’ she managed to say to Raelan on one of their passes.
‘Yes. We do have feasts in the north, your majesty,’ came his gruff reply.
She was going to get nothing from him. It was clear he hated this as much as she did. Possibly more.
With a blare of pipes the dance came to a halt, with both rows of dancers bowing to each other as they had at the start. When Janessa looked up she saw Raelan was pushing his way through the crowd to disappear amongst a press of bodies.
She immediately felt alone and vulnerable. It didn’t help to see Baroness Isabelle Magrida scowling at her, clearly enraged that it was someone else’s son who had managed to poach a dance from the heir to the throne.
Janessa turned, summoning as haughty and proud a manner as she could, and the crowd parted before her. She would not hang around for someone else to take her hand and lead her out for another dance. She’d had more than enough. Let them stare, let them gawp – she wouldn’t play this game any longer.
Two of Skyhelm’s Sentinel Guard moved aside as she left the banquet hall, desperate to find some place of solitude. Nowhere in that massive palace was empty; every corner she turned concealed a gossiping courtier or vigilant guard. Eventually she reached a mezzanine overlooking the palace gardens where she paused for breath, looking out into the dark, fighting back the tears.
Where was her father? Why couldn’t he be here to take care of her? To fight off all the unworthy suitors, the gossiping prigs and toadies.
But she knew why he wasn’t here. She knew why he had been forced to leave her to her fate.
‘Your majesty, I was worried.’
Odaka – her shadow. Deep down she’d known he would be watching her, following her, anticipating her every move. She should have been grateful that there was someone so concerned for her, but all she felt was resentment.
‘Was that a good enough performance for you, regent?’
A pause. She could almost hear him calculating the proper response.
‘I do not understand, my lady.’
‘I’ve played my part. I’ve met your preferred suitor and made all the right noises. I even danced with him. Is the deal done? Is the covenant sealed?’
Odaka conjured up a smile. Even in the dark she was aware of it.
‘My lady, apologies if I have led you to believe otherwise, but the choice to marry is yours. Your father has made that most explicit. Should you find Lord Raelan wanting we will find another, more suitable, match.’
Janessa stared in disbelief as his words sank in. She had flogged herself over this for days, weeks, and now it seemed as though she had done all that for nothing.
‘You mean I have the choice to marry whom I wish?’
‘Of course. Your father and I discussed this at length. He knows how … wilful you are. He realises there could never be a match with anyone you yourself had not approved.’
Janessa felt foolish. Of course she should have trusted her father – he would never have condemned her to a loveless marriage.
‘Very well,’ she replied. ‘Thank you, Odaka.’ And she meant those words of thanks. Odaka was showing a side she had never seen before. Perhaps that deep, powerful chest of his housed a heart after all.
‘Your majesty.’ He bowed. ‘I am here to serve.’
‘Really?’ A wicked thought began to form in her mind. ‘You could start by ridding the palace of a few gossiping courtiers. How about the Magridas, for a start?’
‘I’m afraid that won’t be possible, my lady. Your father has offered them refuge within the palace until his return. With the loss of Dreldun to the Khurtas they have nowhere else to go.’
Oh well – you can’t have everything.
‘Very well, Odaka. I will retire now. Could you make my excuses to our guests?’
‘Of course.’ And with a bow he was gone.
She looked out again into the night, knowing that far to the north her father might be fighting for his very survival as well as that of the Free States. But here she had to face battles of her own, though from what Odaka had told her, she knew her father was doing his utmost to help her fight those too. For that she could only thank him.
And, despite the chance he had given her – to choose her own suitor – she knew there would never be one suitable, not even the handsome Raelan Logar. There would never be one who could capture her heart … because her heart already belonged to someone else.
I
t had been years since Nobul had experienced the discipline of the drill yard. Even after all that time the memory of it still left a strange feeling in the pit of his stomach. Waiting for the serjeant-at-arms, standing alongside your fellows, unsure of what was to come while fully expecting pain and humiliation. And the times when you were forced to march and run for hours, when the serjeant would single someone out for ‘special treatment’ and all you could do was pray it wouldn’t be you …
Now though, he stood in the courtyard, feeling the chill of the coming winter creeping into his old bones, and all he felt was boredom.
He stood there alone, surrounded on all sides by barrack buildings. The insistent tweeting of a single bird from a rooftop behind him was the only sound. Had any other men come forward to volunteer? Most likely no one wanted to join up. With the possibility of war and maybe even siege, the city’s last line of defence would be the Greencoats. They were the ones best trained for the job. King Cael had already taken northwards half the standing Greencoats, Knights of the Blood and Sentinel Guard, leaving a skeleton crew to safeguard the city.
Nobul wasn’t sure why he’d decided to join up with the Greencoats, especially when it was one of them who had been responsible for Markus being laid in the ground. Was it the possibility of being sent to the front? Was he so eager for death? Or maybe he was just eager for a purpose, just eager for something to fill his days, and what better way than this? He had been a fighting man before, and he guessed a fighting man was what he would always be.
But no matter how he tried to tell himself this was his calling, he also knew that alone, on the streets, with no one to watch his back, it wouldn’t be long before the Guild caught up with him. It wasn’t as if they were going to forget about the two enforcers he’d killed.
Did that make all his bravado so much horseshit? Was he really scared? Was he just telling himself he was tough? Just telling himself he was iron and steel, and doing this because he was a breaker of heads?
It didn’t matter any. There was nowhere else for him to go. Nothing else for him to do. He could have joined a mercenary company, but those days were over for him. He was too old for the sleeping rough, the shitty food and the constant fight against illness, thieves and the biting cold.
Besides, if it didn’t go well in the north they would soon have a howling, savage bunch of barbarians battering down the gates of this city.
That would certainly solve all his problems.
Nobul had enquired about recruitment two days before and been told by some mustachioed Greencoat to
come back later; there was no one to help him
. When he’d come back a day later, the same uninterested face greeted him, telling him
come back tomorrow, and wait in the drill yard
for the serjeant
. When he’d come back a third time there had been no one to greet him, but as the door was open he’d just walked in. And so here he was, dutifully waiting in the drill yard, even though he was starting to think no one was coming.
Before he could decide to jack in the whole thing, he heard a wooden door slamming somewhere in the distance. More recruits? Would it be raw young meat or some gnarled and bearded veteran – an old man just like he was?