‘We don’t want it to look too much like an army of occupation,’ said Wulfthram. ‘So I will meet him at the harbour and we will arrive here together, under our own colours
and the banner of Tanaren. Hopefully that will be more acceptable to the more recalcitrant barons here. Anyways, I will leave you both here to chat for now. Nicholas, come to my rooms when you have
finished here; I have just one or two things more to discuss.’
And that is what they did. Father and daughter chatted as they had used to do back in the draughty high-ceilinged rooms of Edgecliff Castle. Both her sisters were fine, as were their husbands
and children; both were fretting about their weight, which was a good sign. She then asked about her brother.
‘The news is not so good there, I am afraid,’ he said. ‘You have heard about the trouble in the east?’
‘A little,’ she replied. ‘News can be slow to arrive here. A battle was lost, I believe.’
‘And your brother was in the midst of it. I won’t go into the details but your brother is holed up in the town of Felmere, surrounded by foes and traitors. Leontius is on his way
there to try and restore some order.’
‘And that is why you are here?’
‘Yes, to drum up some support and hopefully some strength in arms.’
She snorted. ‘Well, good luck with that; they are seeking support and men here to drive out bandits and pirates both on land and at sea.’
‘So I heard. This meeting will be about trying to forge some sort of compromise.’
‘You mean so everybody gets what nobody wants.’
‘Ah, stop being so precocious. It will be so everybody gets a little of what they want, just not all of it.’
‘You were always so much more optimistic than me, Father. An hour with the barons here and we shall see who is right.’
‘I will be, as ever. You may be a grown woman now but nothing has changed between us.’
She stood and hugged him. ‘And for that, Father, I am grateful.’
‘Good,’ he said. ‘In that case no more mad ideas about riding on open moorland with nary a bodyguard to protect you. This is not Edgecliff; you are not entirely among friends
here.’
‘No,’ she said, suitably chastened. She so wanted to tell him about the stone, and all the events that had happened since its discovery, but something held her back. He had enough
problems coming here; he was bound to face a surly reception from some. She could not find it in her heart to burden him further. ‘Are you staying to watch these tumbling dwarves?’ was
all she came out with.
‘I shall forego that particular pleasure,’ he said wryly. ‘I will be eating aboard ship and will not formally arrive here until the fleet and Baron Skellar get here.’
‘How is Jon by the way?’
‘Jon, is it?’ Nicholas raised an eyebrow. ‘You two obviously get on well. He thinks a lot of you, can barely stop talking about you. Carry on like this and the scandal-mongers
will have plenty to gossip about.’
She blushed a little. ‘It is not like that, Father, I am a dutiful wife. It is just that Jon is nearer my age than Wulf; it is easier to talk to him than my husband sometimes. Wulf is a
good man but comes from a different world in some respects.’
‘You mean he knows nothing of fashion.’
‘Exactly!’ she laughed. ‘My point entirely; I mean did you see his jacket? These days, though, I could probably say the same thing about myself. Everything up here is so
practical. If they saw a lace frill, they would probably burn it as an unhealthy pagan influence.’
‘Ach, poor Ceriana, then I suppose a sapphire necklace would be wasted on you here. Never mind, I shall just take it back and give it to your mother; it can go with the emerald ring I have
just given her...’
‘What! You have brought me a necklace! Let’s see it then! Don’t tease me!’
Her father held it up for her. It was beautiful – pale silver with a resplendent blue gem at its centre. ‘You know, I shouldn’t be doing this any more; it is your
husband’s place to buy you things from now on.’
‘Ha! My hair will be grey before it occurs to him to get me such a thing. Make this the last thing you ever get me and I shall wear it until he realises that I like such things. Thank you,
Father; it goes with this dress so I shall put it on now.’
She started to fix it around her neck. In doing so, though, her father’s attention fell on the simple cord fastening of the dull iron amulet.
‘What is that?’ he asked.
She baulked for a second. She could not lie to her father, but neither did she want to give him the truth. ‘It is nothing,’ she said. ‘A sort of good-luck charm.’
‘Really?’ he asked. ‘You would rather die than wear such a humble thing. It ... it has nothing to do with your letters to St Philig’s, has it? That is a business you have
been keeping from me also.’
She looked crestfallen. ‘It has never been my intention to keep anything from you, Father,’ she said. ‘It is a complex and irksome matter that I just didn’t want to
trouble you with. Will you be content if I say I will explain all on your formal arrival here, when we have more time; it cannot be explained in five minutes, maybe not in five hours.’
He seemed to accept her answer. ‘Certainly. May I say that you seem to have matured much since your arrival here. Motherhood, I suppose will accelerate that process, too.’
‘Thank you, Father, though I have no wish to grow old before I am ready to.’
Nicholas looked at her with some concern, as though troubled by a thought he was reluctant to express.
‘You are ... happy here, aren’t you?’
She smiled sweetly. ‘Yes, Father. I do get a little lonely at times, if truth be told. I think I love my husband and I know he has a growing affection for me, but he is a little taciturn
and is often busy. We do not see each other perhaps as often as we would like, but it is as you have always told me – duty is what comes first. We have to find time for each other that fits
around our, or rather his, responsibilities.’
Nicholas stopped for a second, as though considering his next subject before broaching it. When he did so, he lowered his voice so as not to be heard by anyone else.
‘You know the rumour about Leontius and you, and the possible annulment of your marriage here. Where would you stand with that?’
She whispered back at him, trying to speak as forcefully as she could.
‘Do you know the trouble it would cause here? The insult that would be given? The idea of this marriage was to forge alliances, was it not? An annulment would split things apart, probably
irrevocably.’
Her father nodded. ‘But you would be married to the Grand Duke.’
She set her chin stubbornly. ‘Then he should never have made this match out of short-term expediency. Marriage is not a trifling thing to be picked up and discarded like a two-year-old
dress. I know who he is, and how prestigious to our family such a match would be, but Wulf is my husband and it is only he that commands my loyalty. He is a good man and would be shamed in front of
his people. Something like that could force him into exile or, even worse, to take up arms against the Grand Duke. He would have no choice and who, by the Gods, would I support if it came to that?
I could not betray him.’
Nicholas looked at her with a grudging admiration. ‘You are a Hartfield indeed. I am proud of you for your stance. I must admit the thought of your marriage to such a man is very tempting
to me but I will not cross you in this. You are probably the only person in this world to make me say such a thing. So much sharper than your sisters and you have that way about you, always able to
bend me to your will. If the Grand Duke insists in this matter, I cannot stop him, but I will defend your interests as best I can.’
‘Thank you, Father. Leontius really has no idea if that is his plan. These people are proud, and Wulf has stood beside me in matters and ways I have yet to explain to you. I owe him for
that and for the child we are having.’
He nodded. ‘The child is important whether boy or girl. A connection has been forged between our family and the noblest house of the north and west. If the Grand Duke dies without issue,
his siblings have little backing among the other nobles. His brother has the disposition of a drunken ox and his sister, though clever and beautiful, loses support merely by being a woman. We could
be looking at a child with a claim to the Dukedom of Tanaren in the future if the gods of fortune work in our favour.’
She rolled her eyes. ‘We have always been close to the Grand Dukedom without ever actually attaining it, have we not?’
‘Now that, my child, is an untruth. The sixth to tenth Grand Dukes were all Hartfields. The man who was to become the eleventh Grand Duke was ousted, partly because of rumours that he was
part elven.’
Her eyes widened. ‘Are you serious? We have elven blood?’
‘It was just a rumour. His mother was from Zerannon when relations with the elves were more cordial. Even after her marriage she would often return there, as she had little affection for
her husband, Grand Duke or not. She would visit the elves often and it is said she dallied with the lord of one tribe. A child was born nine months after one visit, so you can understand how the
stories started. Within a decade or two of all this happening the elves and humans were at one other’s throats and any physical relations between the two peoples were banned. I really wish
you had studied your family’s history a little more.’
She looked at him, her eyes large and reflective. ‘I never thought I would agree with you on this but you are right, I wish I had.’
He gave her a fatherly kiss on her forehead. ‘Enough of these dry subjects for now. I have to leave. I will see you again shortly and we can talk at much greater length about many
things.’ He looked at her necklace and at the cheap cord under it. ‘Fare you well, little one. Keep smiling, and look after the child you carry.’
‘Goodbye, Father.’ She hugged him one more time, as though reluctant to let him leave. She had to release him eventually, though; they both smiled warmly at each other before he
turned and headed off in the direction of Wulfthram’s quarters.
Less than an hour later she was sat next to her husband in the hall. The tables had been moved to be next to the walls, leaving the central area free to stage the evening’s entertainment.
There was spitted ox and boar and large chunks of freshly baked bread. The winter vegetables, kale and leeks and cabbage, had been cooked into a wholesome potage and it was not long before Ceriana
was full to bursting, licking grease and gravy off her fingers in a way that would be considered indelicate back home, but which here made her seem just one of the crowd. She recognised all the
attendant barons from the previous council meeting; the only one missing seemed to be Baron Skellar, with the only new addition being Baron Vorfgan. He sat almost opposite her sharing jokes with
those around him, though once she caught him looking at her with a strange, almost disturbing look in his eyes – one that she couldn’t fathom but one that she could not help but find
unsettling.
The evening’s entertainment was what could be termed rustic. The musicians played at a ferocious pace, the singers sang folk songs both wistful and bawdy, many in the local
Kibil–Tanarese patois which she still found to be near incomprehensible. Wulfthram, she could see, was trying to deflect accusations of circling too close to the Grand Duke by putting on a
show that appealed to the romantic Kibil ideal – the yearning for the homeland and for a lifestyle that had probably never existed – one which he knew the barons would lap up.
The stage play was of a similar mien. Again, she could understand little of what they were saying, so Wulfthram had to explain to her key aspects of the story. It told of a tribal Kibilese
chieftain who fell in love with the daughter of the invading Chiran general. Ostracised by their own peoples, they wed and took their own lives that very same night, little realising that it was
the night of dolour. This was the name of the night in which Kibil was annexed into the empire. If the tragic couple had just travelled to the docks they could have taken ship unnoticed amongst
thousands of other fleeing tribesmen, heading south to Tanaren and voluntary exile from their homelands of purple heather and rugged black mountains, swapping it for a life of fishing and seafaring
in a little-known corner of the world.
Between each act the jesters came out, throwing water over each other and telling barbed jokes at the expense of the assembled nobility. Wulfthram was a reclusive misery, Einar an overweight
drunk, Thudig an indolent slob and so forth. They even made a joke at Vorfgan’s expense, referring to the mysterious death of the former baron’s son. Vorfgan laughed off the rather limp
jokes they were making, but the implications of their words were obvious.
Then finally came the tumblers. It was the sort of entertainment that would definitely be described as ‘lowbrow’ back in Edgecliff, the sort best suited for a dockside tavern with a
large floor space. The dwarves were dressed in colourful outfits and went about their set with great enthusiasm and no little skill. Ceriana rather found herself enjoying the spectacle despite her
better judgement. It was not every day, after all, that you could see a column of people five high with the topmost performer flinging himself into the air to be caught by a colleague standing on
the floor yards away. The crowd loved it, shouting uproariously during the entire performance and hammering their eating knives on the tables, and when it had all finished the applause did not stop
for an age. Ceriana played her full part in it.
It was late in the evening and the entertainment was at an end. The room was stiflingly hot and she was glad to leave it and head for her quarters. Accommodation was not readily available for
all and most of the guests were to bed down on the floor in the main hall, furs and blankets being provided for their comfort. Barons like Einar and Thudig had their own rooms; being local they
visited regularly and so were treated as special guests. Vorfgan, too, had his own room, though how he had managed to wangle that Ceriana did not know.