The Singer's Crown (42 page)

“I thought you were giving me some responsibility, yet it seems you are still just using me, not trusting me to make the judgments. Father, I am no longer a child.”

Gerrod snorted, crossing his arms. “When you act this way, that is exactly how you appear. A child.”

This brought her up short, and though the rage flared in her eyes, and her entire body stiffened, she did not lash out.

“Gerrod,” Orie murmured, shaking his head as if to chide the king. “In fact, we wanted you to be angry.” Orie placed a soothing hand on Melisande's shoulder. “He approached the meeting presuming on your friendship; now he is off-balance, unsure of how he stands with you. We've got him right where we want him, thanks to you.”

“If that was your purpose, I could have served it better had I known what you wanted of me,” she replied softly, arms crossed. Melisande turned from her husband and found herself looking at Fionvar. She blinked, her features hard, and he wondered if Kattanan could be any more off-balance than the princess.

Orie, too, glanced at Fionvar and smiled, reassured of his brother's trustworthiness. For himself, Fionvar doubted Melisande would again come close to trusting him. As far as the princess was concerned, the three men were conspiring against her, assuming her role in their plotting was secure. How secure, Fionvar did not wish to hazard a guess. From where he stood, their decision to keep the secret began to look like a terrible mistake.

“You knew him best, Melisande,” Orie said. “How did he seem to you?”

Glancing from her father to her husband, Melisande flopped into a chair. As they settled to either side of her, Fionvar remained standing, a little apart, occasionally looking out the window to the feast being laid in the gardens.

Melisande frowned. “He has the sort of presence he used to have while singing. He projects the air of royalty very well, as if it were a new performance. He always had a way of commanding an audience.” She paused to mull this over, and Fionvar allowed a little smile, recalling his speech to the duchess about this very thing. The princess went on. “He lets himself show more feeling now, as well. He got a little angry with me, and I imagine he's made an excellent impression on the courtiers present.”

“I was hoping they would make an impression on him,” Gerrod snorted, “remind him of how many armies I can summon at a moment's notice.”

Melisande shook her head. “I don't believe that he cares. It seemed as if—”

They waited for her to continue, then Orie prompted, “As if what?”

“As if it didn't matter how many nobles or how many guards we brought there, I was the only one of importance.” The furrows of her brow smoothed out a little as she realized this, and Orie shared a look with her father over her head. “Is his story true?”

Gerrod replied slowly, “Thorgir should have been more careful, and his subjects would not have risen against him—certainly not to put a castrate on the throne.”

She looked up quickly. “Then he is…? When he told the story, he said that was a disguise, and his voice is certainly different.”

“Trickery,” Orie said. “What we see now is what he wishes us to see.” He shrugged. “Still, we ought to play along with this new lie until we decide how to handle him.” Orie leaned forward and took her hands. “There is another reason, though, why he spoke only to you. I hesitate to bring this up.” Gerrod nodded sternly for him to go on, and he did, but haltingly. “I do not know if you were aware of this, but several of your servants and ladies have confirmed that they believe he was in love with you.”

“With me?” Her eyes flew wide. “But he's a castrate, not even—and I…” She trailed off, her face grave. “It's absurd. Impossible.” She shook her head.

“Naturally, but still he dared.” Orie let that dangle a moment, then continued, “I recall when I first arrived at your ball, and he was so presumptuous as to touch your hair without permission. What would such a creature not dare?”

“I remember how quick you were to leap to my defense,” Melisande murmured. “To think that he was so close to me. If I had suspected how he felt, things would have been very different.” She lowered her head a little. “You told me to wear something attractive because you wanted him to reveal his feelings for me.”

Orie nodded. “And I think he made them very clear. I believe you could have King Rhys polishing your boots if you so desire.”

Melisande smiled a little at that.

“He will want a royal apology,” Gerrod put in abruptly, “for our part in Thorgir's actions. I would, in his position. If my daughter is correct, he will have no trouble becoming a leader of men. What I hear from Lochdale is that he appeared like a miracle, riding bareheaded into the heart of the battle on a magical steed. He may be a legend already, and it is hard to defeat a legend if we should come to war one day, so—much as I'd like to—I ought not to offend the little king.”

“But a eunuch?” Orie inquired. “I find it hard to believe that all of his people have forgotten that rumor.”

“On the other hand, if we accept his ascension and his overtures of friendship, we will be subjected to more talk about the Traitor,” Gerrod snarled, his fist clenching.

“Also true, Father,” said Melisande, “but we could offer the apology under the condition that he make no more demands about the Traitor.”

Fionvar held his tongue, but his right hand clenched briefly, and he kept his eyes on the princess, trying to judge how much of her talk was true.

“Why not have a ball?” Orie suggested.

Gerrod laughed. “What are we celebrating?”

“Hear me out, Your Majesty. We shall announce a ball in his honor, in perhaps two days, if he can wait so long for all of the barons to attend. I mean a huge state affair.” He flung his arms wide to indicate the magnitude of the event. “You will apologize formally for assisting Thorgir and take his hand in front of all the nobles we can muster. He will be completely overawed by the festivities.”

“I doubt it,” Melisande remarked.

Orie lowered his voice to murmur, “If he is seated beside you, my love, I think he will forget he ever cared about anything else.”

She squared her shoulders. “Very well then; I shall return to the garden and offer your invitation.”

Rising, Gerrod patted her hand. “I understand how distasteful this must be to you, considering his perverse interest in you, but for the good of the kingdom, you must persevere. I'll see you to your ladies to refresh yourself.” The king and his daughter left arm in arm.

Fionvar moved a little closer to Orie. “How've you been, brother?”

Orie replied. “I am quite well.”

“I heard what happened on the tower. Do you think that Wolfram's—”

“The Traitor,” Orie corrected. “You don't wish Gerrod to get the wrong idea.”

Refusing to be sidetracked, Fionvar repeated, “Do you think that the traitor's”—his voice struggled with the word—“blood had anything to do with it?”

“How should I know?” came the harsh response. “The stupid wizard shielded her knowledge from me. We had an arrangement, and she broke it.”

This piqued Fionvar's curiosity, and he asked, “What did she get from this arrangement?”

Orie cast a dark sidelong glance at him, considering. “Something she wanted. Something I no longer need.”

Fionvar crossed his arms. “Why don't you trust me, Orie, even that much?”

The sudden laughter caught Fionvar by surprise, making him take a step back. “Oh, Fion. Someday soon you'll find out. I hope you think it's as funny as I do.” He craned his neck, looking toward the window, and crossed to lean out of it. “There goes my beautiful bride.”

“I am surprised you are so eager for her to do this, Orie.” Fionvar came to stand beside him, watching the progress of Melisande's little procession into the garden.

“She loves me, Fion.” A shadow of a frown crossed his features. “She is also a little afraid of me, which serves me well. It encourages her to obey.”

Fionvar opened his mouth to reply, then thought better of it. He turned to see Melisande in the distance curtsy to his king, and the king's grave bow in response. Orie was underestimating both of them. His wife was not the child she had been, nor was King Rhys the weakling Orie believed. Orie would be wrong about this; he must be.

“YOUR MEN
seem to be enjoying the feast,” Melisande said after she delivered the king's message. “Are you not eating, Your Majesty?”

His title on her lips sounded so wooden that he wondered if she said it that way on purpose. “I never eat before a performance, Your Highness.”

She lowered her chin just a touch. “Is that what this is for you, a performance?”

“Am I not onstage before your court, and before your father?” He gestured toward the palace, continuing, “And you, Your Highness. Am I not onstage before you, this time on my own behalf ?” Kattanan said this last at a low pitch, almost a sigh.

Stiffening, she took a step back from him, her tone instantly frosty. “I think not, Your Majesty. You are here on behalf of your kingdom, a diplomatic visit.”

A moment passed, then he saw how she had misunderstood him, recalling the first time they had met when she was being courted. Kattanan shook his head, and little sparks danced from the gemstones of his crown. “I meant only that I must somehow convince you of my good intentions. I am to present myself in the best possible way to show you that what I say is true.”

At this, she raised her eyebrows and said nothing.

The expression reminded him so much of Wolfram that Kattanan felt a shiver run through him, sobering him. “You are wondering how you can believe anything I say.”

Melisande stroked unseen dust from her skirts. She looked away from him, toward the tables where most of his knights were being served. “I came only to deliver my father's message, Your Majesty. I have done so. Perhaps on your next visit, the opportunity—”

“Will you walk with me?” he broke into her stream of regal language, bringing her eyes back to him. “Your Highness, will you walk with me?”

She glanced wildly back toward the palace, then regained her royal facade. “If it is your wish to walk in the garden, I will accompany you, Your Majesty.” He offered his arm, but she stepped ahead of him down the path, her pace quickening as it had when he had been her singer and she had not been heir to a kingdom. Clasping his hands behind him, he caught up with her.

“Where should we walk, Your Majesty?”

“Here,” he said, indicating a path, “toward the songbirds.”

“How fitting,” she replied, not looking at him.

When they stood before the cage, watching the swirling blue-and-gold birds, Kattanan turned to face her. With the birdsong rising about them, no other could hear him say, “Your Highness, you need not try so hard to wound me. When last we met, my will was not my own. Finistrel knows, I never meant to deceive you.”

“Yet you did, Your Majesty.” She clutched the bars of the cage, staring at the whirlwind of birds. “You deceived all of us, biding your time until you could appear as king and savior of your people. How did you expect me to receive you?”

“What you see today is the lie, Your Highness. What I was then, how I felt—those things were true. I was not born to be a king, and it was never what I wanted.”

The tilt of her head revealed her sidelong glance. Just as quickly, she looked away. “What did you want, then? What do you want now?”

Kattanan met that shadowed gaze and did not trust himself to answer.

Even so, she burst out, “You have no right to speak to me like this! I am a princess, and you, you are a—” She stopped herself.

“I am a king, Melisande,” he replied softly, using her name like a prayer for her understanding. “Against my conscience and my wishes, I am a king, the last of my line.”

“Do you hold yourself above me now? I know what you are, what you have always been.” Her body shook with anger, flushing her cheeks; her beauty flamed.

“A human being! A person, just like you, with dreams and terrors—just like you. I fear, I hope, I hurt, and yes, I love. Great Goddess, Melisande, listen to me! Please listen, and hear me as you have never heard me before.” He took her shoulders and spun her to face him. She tore away but stopped, staring, her fists clenched and shaking.

“Don't touch me. Don't ever touch me.”

“There was a time when you were not afraid.”

“Long ago, before you left me; before I knew how much you lied to me! My father, my husband, his brother—is there not a man alive who tells the truth?” Her eyes gleamed and, for a moment, he was certain she would weep. “Everything has changed. You don't know me.”

“I know that you are not the same, Melisande, I never expected that. I only—”

“Oh, no? What did you expect? Now that you are a king, I should fall into your arms like a common whore?” She swept her arms out as if she would push him away with the angry wind. The birds clamored and screeched, egging her on. “Well, I shall not,” breathed Melisande, then louder. “Whatever it is that you want, King Rhys, you shall never have it. Sing whatever you wish, I will not hear you.”

Kattanan spoke quietly, his voice absolutely clear. “By virtue of rank alone, Your Highness, your rank and mine, I deserve better than how you are treating me.”

“So now you seek to instruct me in, what, protocol? Deportment? What is it that you want?” At last she looked at him, but sidelong, beneath her lashes.

“Respect. If not for me, then for my crown, and for your own, Melisande. No wonder—” He stopped, shaking his head. “Good day, Your Highness.” He turned to go.

“What else?” she demanded, not turning after him. “What were you going to say, Your Majesty? What more could you possibly say?”

Breathing slowly, Kattanan turned back to her. “No wonder Wolfram still treated you as a child.” He watched her trembling shoulders. “That is all I can possibly say.” His throat clenched as he witnessed the shock that broke across her face. She whirled, gathering her skirts, and fled into the trees with her guards in pursuit.

Kattanan's hands were trembling as she vanished beyond the wall. “What happened?” Jordan asked, coming up quietly.

Kattanan shrugged one shoulder, still watching Melisande's wake, where the disturbed flowers lashed their heads in frenzied approval. The cacophonous laughter of the birds grated at his ears. “I went too far, asked too much of her.”

“Go back to camp,” Jordan said quietly. “You need rest, maybe a song.”

“Sing? After that, you think I could sing?” He let Jordan's hand guide him back toward the others. Kattanan took a few steps down the path, but a voice stopped him.

“Your Majesty,” said the wizard, still disguised as a hulking guard. “Forgive me. You recall I said there was something I needed to look for in the palace. Now might be a good time; tomorrow, they may not be so careless about checking for wizards at the gate.”

Kattanan nodded, but Jordan asked, “Do you need my assistance?”

“If you are still willing, but I don't need you.” She tilted her head toward the shaken king, then let her eyes meet Jordan's. “Not that I would turn away your help.”

Squaring his shoulders, Kattanan said, “I'll be all right, once I get some peace.”

Jordan squeezed Kattanan's shoulder and released him, joining the wizard.

Lyssa glowered. “I'll come, too. A woman is often allowed places neither men nor wizards can go.”

“Very well then,” the disguised wizard replied faintly. The trio bowed, and Jordan lingered a moment as the other two slipped into the trees.

“She will come round to you, Kat,” Jordan said.

“She is a married woman, with a jealous husband. She may not even consent to meet with me again. Certainly not like this.” He gestured toward the birdcage.

“Give her time to remember your song.”

Kattanan gave a half shrug. “Catch your ladies, Jordan. Go with the Goddess.”

“And you, Your Majesty.” Jordan caught up with them under the shade of a columned walkway. The wizard had resumed female form—an unremarkable servant. “Just tell me what we're looking for”—Lyssa acknowledged Jordan's arrival with an imperious nod—“and I can seek out Fionvar, or even Orie, and ask—don't look at me like that!” Jordan and the wizard stared, their brows furrowed. “I won't reveal your secrets; I'm not so stupid as that, but they know this place better than any of us.”

The wizard glowered fiercely. “We cannot risk revealing our presence, or that of the book to Orie. Goddess knows what he'd do if he knew it was here.”

“Fionvar would help, though, if he could,” Jordan pointed out, trying to soften the wizard's anger. Instead, he found both women glowering at him. “Lyssa, it is an excellent idea. Alswytha, where is the book likely to be?”

She glanced from one to the other, then grudgingly replied, “When I sought a place to conceal it, I gathered a number of books and sent them to Prince Wolfram, as a well-known scholar. So the books are now in the palace library, or in Wolfram's collection, if it has been kept.” The wizard sighed. “Our quest might be a hopeless one.”

“It's a book of magic, isn't it?” Lyssa asked, some of her bravado fading.

“It is disguised as Raven duCerulan's
On the Gathering of Herbs and of Their Uses
. A small volume, bound in green and remarkably tedious.”

“I will see what I can do. I'd like to speak to Fionvar anyhow.” Lyssa started off, but looked back to Jordan. “What will you do?” she asked pointedly.

Jordan took a breath, noticing the way the color in her cheeks made her face glow with a beauty even more exquisite. “I'd, ah, I'd better stay with the wizard for now. If we're found, they won't suspect who she is if we are together.”

“Together,” Lyssa echoed, “of course. We can meet back at the funeral grounds at dusk. There should be no one about then—unless someone's dead.” She strode off under the arches. She let the spark of anger carry her swiftly between a pair of guards and into the palace proper, where she paused to glance about and set toward the main court.

Fionvar nearly ran into her, shocked to see his sister there, but he made an effort to hear what she needed. He guided her to the library, only to discover Melisande already in residence, there. At the sight of him, she left without a word. He found the little lantern she had set aside and turned the shield to allow a brighter light to spread into the room. Lyssa slipped in around the door, and it was quickly shut again.

She grinned, her face flushed with excitement. “Was that the princess leaving?”

Fionvar nodded, distracted by Melisande's appearance. After Kattanan's entourage had departed, Melisande retired to the kennels—still wearing her fine gown—and refused to admit anyone. The king and Orie had both cornered her there, but she would tell them nothing of the conversation by the birdcage, and they left to take out their frustrations on a cask of wine and whoever happened by. Fionvar had been trying to avoid them when Lyssa ran into him.

On the carrel where the princess had been a stack of books teetered, as if hastily piled. They tumbled as Fionvar approached, and he stared at the cover of the last one, the only one remaining:
A History of the Virgins of the Lady
.

Lyssa's voice interrupted his wondering. “How's this place organized?”

“It would help if you could tell me what you're looking for,” Fionvar said pointedly. His patience with this day was wearing dangerously thin.

Lyssa flapped her hand in a negligent gesture. “Just some herbal thing.”

“Medicinal?”

“General, I think.” She frowned. “It was a book of Wolfram's.”

Her brother nodded, leading the way toward a section in the back. They started to scan the titles, Fionvar taking the top shelves while Lyssa crawled along the bottom. “Is it in Strelledor?”

Lyssa's red hair tossed as she looked up at him. “I don't think so,” she replied, but her voice lacked its usual confidence; Lyssa couldn't read Strelledor.

“Well, let's hope not.” He hefted a large volume, but before he'd read the title, she told him, “It would be small.”

Back went the giant tome. They inched along in silence for a moment.

“If it's a book of Wolfram's, it may have been destroyed. I don't know what happened to his things after…” He let the sentence peter out.

“Let's hope not,” she echoed. She straightened up and looked up toward the windows. “I have to go soon, to meet them. Who can we ask about Wolfram's things?”

Fionvar shrugged, and his shoulders sagged as he let out a yawn. “Orie and Melisande weren't even here yet. Most of the people who would have been loyal to the prince are gone by now.” He pursed his lips.

“You've thought of something,” Lyssa prompted.

“Wolfram had a page, Thomas, who used to be a friend of Kattanan's. Trouble is…” Fionvar scuffed his foot against the carpet. “He's in the dungeon. Remember during the funeral there was a bell ringing?”

“That was him? So how do we talk to him?”

Fionvar shook his head. “There are guards and gates between us and him. I'll see what I can find out and look for you tomorrow.”

“If only there were a way to free Thomas and send him home with Kattanan.” Her mail clinked softly as she paced toward the door. “We'll think of something.” She hesitated at the door. “Fion? Do you think Jordan still has feelings for me?” She plucked at a sliver of wood.

“Yes, last I knew. Are you considering leaving the Sisterhood?”

“No,” she replied quickly, then, “Maybe.” She freed the bit of wood and let it fall from her fingers. “I'd have to, in order to marry.”

“Is that what you want?”

“Jordan would be worth it.” Lyssa turned to face her brother, leaning back against the door, arms folded. “He's handsome, fun; not a lustful bore like most men.”

“That isn't what I asked,” Fionvar responded. “Do you want to marry him?”

“Who wouldn't?”

Fionvar flung up his hands. “Why do I bother? I'm going to bed,” he called over his shoulder. “Do whatever you will.” He left her standing in the corridor.