‘No it isn’t,’ replied Leontius quietly. ‘Well, you know what to do.’
The man bowed. ‘Yes, my Lord.’ He turned to leave but the Grand Duke raised his hand to stop him. ‘Wait, there is one other thing.’
Henk raised an appraising eyebrow. ‘My Lord.’
‘The fleet leaving for the north, I want you to be on it.’
‘For what purpose, my Lord?’
‘To observe primarily; I have spoken to you about the situation out there before and have told you what I consider to be the most desirable outcome. I do not expect you to do anything bar
report back to me, but, if an opportunity presents itself, well I will trust your judgement. Do not fail me and do not ripple the waters or cause a situation that might inflame the barons up there.
They are a prickly lot and easy to take offence, remember that.’
‘As you wish, my Lord. I shall deal with the Schurmann situation first, then I and my men will find a place on the fleet with the marines.’
‘I will get you a place on the flagship, the
Lucellia
; it is named after my mother, though whether that is I good omen or not I really cannot say.’
Henk stifled a laugh. ‘Very well, my Lord. With your permission I will leave immediately, I have much to do in a brief time.’
‘No, not yet. I have one final task for you.’
‘And what is that exactly, my Lord?’
‘Baron Sydmon and Lady Delphine – arrange for them to have a guest room here. Make sure they are drunk ... no, better still, drug his drink to ensure that he sleeps the night. When
his wife is pliable enough, bring her to my rooms; she can serve her country by serving me this night.’
‘It will be as you wish, my Lord; I will attend to the matter immediately.’
He bowed and left the room, leaving Leontius gazing out of the window with his goblet in his hand. Behind him, a servant entered, his soft footsteps barely discernible on the carpeted stone
floor.
‘My Lord, the guests are taking their places in the banqueting hall. Food cannot be served until you join them.’
‘Of course, I will be along immediately. Tell me, they are serving venison, yes?’
‘Of course, my Lord, cooked with seasonal fruit; the centrepiece of the display includes an arrangement made with their antlers.’
‘Good, I love venison.’
The servant bowed and left. Leontius sighed softly through his teeth, drained his goblet, and with his shoulders bowed slightly, followed the other man down the stairs.
Sitting in her room by her favourite window, Ceriana watched the baron’s staff tread gingerly across the cobbles, thick as they were with snow and slush. Winter came
early in this part of the world. She had been out riding, trying to clear her head, when the first snows started to fall, tentatively at first, but gradually gathering momentum, the heavy flakes
catching on the furs she was swathed in. When she had returned, nose as red as sliced beetroot, Ebba had commented on how she looked like she was born out here. It was meant as a compliment, though
Ceriana wasn’t really sure if she should take it as one.
She had yet to live twenty years and was sure that for at least half of it she had done nothing more than sit and look out of a window somewhere. Back in Edgecliff Castle she had spent hours
watching life go by outside her chambers, and now, hundreds of miles away, she was doing the exact same thing. She likened herself to Mountfessen’s princess. Mountfessen, one of
Tanaren’s favourite writers, once told a tale of a princess, the only child of a powerful king. They had lost so many children, either through miscarriage or poor health, that when finally a
girl was born her husband declared her so perfect, so beautiful, that no one would be allowed to go near or touch her. He kept her in a room in a high castle where only her nurses and tutors were
allowed to go. She grew into a beautiful young woman, clever and desperately lonely. She spent all her waking hours looking wistfully out of her window, wondering what the world had to offer.
One day, a handsome young man, a prince from a nearby realm, espied her looking at him and instantly fell in love with her. He approached her father for her hand in marriage but was rebuffed.
Finally, driven mad with longing and desire, the prince stormed her tower with his men. What he did not know, though, was that the king was a powerful mage. Seeing the prince charging up the long
staircase, he used all of his strength and power to cast a slowing spell on the prince and his men. Such was the energy he put into the spell that the king collapsed and died where he stood, but
the spell was still cast. The prince did not notice the spell himself but kept running up the staircase; it seemed endless but such was his love for the princess he was not daunted. One by one his
men fell, wearied and exhausted, but the prince did not stop. Finally he reached the door. He shoulder-charged it, shivering it into a thousand pieces and entered her chamber – only to see
her withered and skeletal, dead from old age and dead for many years, still sitting in the very seat from where he had first seen her. She had a rose in her lap that crumbled to dust in his fingers
and a letter, sealed, which was addressed ‘To my Prince’. Eagerly, through his tears he prepared to open the seal, when the letter, too, dissolved into ashes in his grasp.
Yes, thought Ceriana, that was her, except for the beautiful bit obviously. They had been back on the island for some days. They had spent one evening with Baron Farnerun, during which he had
pledged to restore the villagers, most of whom were still alive but who had fled elsewhere, to their town and to build a castle or defence work to watch the ruins on their behalf. Then they had
taken ship again. Their first stop had been at the tiny harbour of Eltlo, where they dropped off Haelward, Willem and Alys, so that they could continue their journey back to Tanaren City. Haelward
had offered to return again with the dragon tooth that was held at the university but Ceriana had politely thanked him and told him not to bother. There was no one left to translate its writings
anyway, and even if they could, Dureke’s words still rang strongly with her. Nothing could now be done to ‘cure’ her, to rid her of her affliction, and so the existence of the
tooth now seemed entirely superfluous.
Parting with Alys affected her more than she thought it would. She was of a similar age, if a little older, and was a link to Tanaren City. Her accent and mannerisms were that of a southern girl
and Ceriana had seen something of a sister in her. Alys, too, seemed equally affected. The two girls hugged, said their farewells and promised to write as often as they could. From there it was
back to Osperitsan; they had to journey through rough seas most of the time, making Ceriana as sick as a dog, though normally sea travel seemed second nature to her. It was touching to see her
husband so concerned for her. He left her on the bed while he slept on the floor and insisted she was covered in at least one blanket all of the time. Thus cosseted she arrived back at the baronial
hall and within the hour was back at her window, living her vicarious lifestyle.
Two men were unloading iron-bound barrels in the courtyard. Idly, she wondered what was in them; some foodstuff she imagined, brought in for the winter. As she watched them sweating, despite the
temperature, her mind wandered over the events at Oxhagen, for the thousandth thousandth time. Nothing had changed for her. Despite all the death, the heroic sacrifice of Ulian, those poor people
in the town, for her personally nothing had changed. She resolved to ask her father about her family history when she next saw him; perhaps she did carry some elven blood in her veins. Dureke had
thought her special, a notion she found ridiculous, but her bond with the beast could not be broken and it was this inability to decisively affect the state of things that troubled her the
most.
Except of course this wasn’t entirely true. Something had changed. She had known for a while, of course, and Ebba had known for longer and now it was time to tell her husband, who, being a
man, was completely ignorant of the situation.
She was about to go to his rooms and see him when he pre-empted her by walking into her room, as always, without knocking.
‘I have some news’ he said.
‘As have I,’ she replied, ‘but, as you have seen fit to barge in on me without even knocking ... again, perhaps your news should come first.’
He actually looked quite sheepish. ‘I apologise. I am so used to treating this place as my own. I will knock from now on.’
‘Good. It is nice to know that I am actually listened to. And your news?’
‘Oh yes, my news. The Council of the North meets later this month.’
‘Of course, four times a year, is it not?’
‘That is true. What I am trying to say, if given a chance, is that your father has brought forward his attendance to this council and not the spring one.’
Her mouth dropped. ‘You are serious?’
‘Completely. I imagine it has something to do with the protracted war in the east; at long last we are being asked to contribute. He will have quite the job selling this to some of the
barons.’
She beamed the warmest smile it was possible for her to give.
‘Perhaps the Gods are still watching after all. Has he left already?’
‘I do not know. I have been given to understand he will be travelling by ship, the
Lucellia
it says in the letter.’
‘Then I shall pray to Hytha for calm seas and a safe journey. I need not write to him to convey my news after all.’
Wulfthram sat on the edge of the bed, so he was now facing Ceriana directly. ‘You are pleased, I take it?’
‘Of course. It is not your fault. You could not do more for me but I miss my family, especially my father; we were close you understand.’
‘I understand. Now, what is this news of yours?’
She rolled her eyes skywards. ‘Ebba said this about men – that they cannot see that which is under their very nose.’
‘Artorus’s holy beard, are you determined to talk for ever without saying anything?’
‘Oh Wulf, you notice nothing different about me?’
He scanned her up and down – her face was a little rounder perhaps? He said so.
‘My face?’ She rushed to the mirror and started scanning herself closely. ‘No, there is no real difference there. My weight. I have put on weight, haven’t I? I know we
rarely sleep together at the moment but you must have noticed. You must have.’
He gave a polite cough. ‘Possibly, but I would never tell you. I thought our northern diet was agreeing with you.’
‘Bread and meat? Meat and bread? Bread dipped in meaty gravy? Meat served in a hollowed-out loaf of bread? Oh and the occasional apple. No, it is not the diet.’ Still seeing his
slightly bewildered frown she roared in frustration. ‘I am pregnant, you idiot, and I hope our child does not have a head full of sawdust like its father.’
Wulfthram’s dark eyes opened slightly, something that was tantamount to an outpouring of emotion in such a man. ‘Seriously? Are you sure?’
‘Ebba was sure long before I, but yes, it is certain.’
‘How long have you known? When is it due?’
‘In the spring, it may well have happened on our first time together.’
‘Well, by all the Gods, and I only did it to stop you snoring.’
She threw a cushion at him, which he deflected easily. He threw it back, catching her on her head, disturbing one of her combs. A soft brown tress came free, falling over her face. She laughed
and threw the cushion back, making him grunt. She then launched herself at him, making him fall back on the bed. She followed him and shortly after was curled up next to him, snuggled into his
right arm. At this point, he grew serious again.
‘There was something I wished to discuss with you, something I keep forgetting about, but this news has brought it straight back to me.’
Her eyes were closed. ‘Go on.’
‘In that chamber, underground with those spirits, before Ulian sacrificed himself, it was you who offered to give your life up. Why did you do it? Especially knowing it was not just your
life that would be lost.’
Her eyes flickered open, wide and forlorn. ‘Because it was the right thing to do. Those priests want to bring chaos to this world; they want the deaths of thousands of people. Compared to
that, me, you, the child are not important. In fact, our high status practically demands self-sacrifice, if it is to protect the weak.’
Wulfthram turned his head to look at her. ‘You have a noble heart, Ceriana Osperitsan-Hartfield. I know few nobles that I could say the same of. But be aware you have others to consider
now.’
‘You are right, and thank you for the compliment; it is not often I receive one.’
‘Then the fault is mine, for I should compliment you more often. There is something else, though, isn’t there? These strange changes in you, I wonder if the child is affected in any
way?’
‘You mean will it be born with scales and a tail? I have distant cousins with this problem. Truthfully, though, I do not know. Ebba and the other servants have noticed nothing unusual in
me.’
‘But you haven’t been sick, or wanted to eat strange food, or anything like that.’
‘All the food here is strange and, yes, I have been sick, not as often nor as violently as my sisters, who were martyrs to it, but I have. It was how Ebba first guessed about me. And
tired; at times I have felt so weary that I could sleep on a bare stone floor’
‘But you never told me!’
She sat up and looked at him directly. ‘Oh come on. Wulf. During our first weeks together you barely noticed if I was still breathing, let alone crouched over a bucket spilling my guts
out. I would have told you earlier but I wanted this matter with the stone resolved first; also, well, other matters worry me, too.’
‘Other matters? Such as?’
‘My narrow hips. Hartfield girls are either quite broad in the beam like my sisters or built like a besom handle, like me. And the latter group have always had problems with children,
either with losing them early on, or with the actual birth itself. It concerns me, that is all.’
‘That is pure nonsense, though. Look at Bernea, the head cook’s wife, so thin she could squeeze through an iron gate yet she has nine healthy children and has never lost one. You
worry about this just for the sake of worry, my girl. You need to spend your time more creatively, though hard riding or anything strenuous are no longer viable options’