Dragon Prince 02 - The Star Scroll (6 page)

Clutha glanced up from the written list of expenditures. “You’ve the look of the last sunlight about you, Tiel.”

“Indeed, your grace, Riyan and I have just received word that Prince Ajit of Firon is dead. A seizure of the heart, it was.”

Kiele made appropriate noises of shock and grief, but her mind raced. Ajit had no direct heir. She tried to recall the collateral branches of the Fironese royal house, and if she was allied with or related to any of them.

Clutha gave a heavy sigh, shaking his bald head. “Unhappy news. Many times I’ve told him he should live life more easily, as befits men of our age.”

Kiele coughed to hide a giggle, remembering that Ajit had planned to take yet another wife—his seventh—this year at the
Rialla.
Halian caught her eye and his lips twitched.

“There’ll be one less wedding at Lastday this year,” he remarked.

His father thundered, “You will mourn our royal cousin with respect, you insolent fool!”

“I mean no disrespect,” Halian said contritely, but there was that in his eyes that told Kiele he wished the old man dead, burned, and out of his life. She lowered her gaze to her lap after casting a careful look of sympathy at him. Yes, he was ripe for the plucking, if Moswen was clever and played on his impatience with his father. Clutha behaved as if his son was still a lad of barely twenty winters, not a man nearly forty. Kiele would have to remember to tell Moswen the best approach to use. She would be a princess before autumn.

 

News of Ajit’s death dampened Lyell’s ardor, for which Kiele was profoundly grateful. While he slept in the huge state bed, she returned to the dressing chamber and lit the candle on her desk. Its reflection in the mirror gave her enough reading light as she scanned the letter from Afina.

Afina never wrote about anything that did not interest Kiele and they both knew it. Kiele had asked her to use her contacts in Princemarch to get definite news about a boy said to be Roelstra’s son. She had been toying with a particular scheme all winter, working out ideas—purely speculative until now, when it seemed that her arrow shot in darkness had hit an unexpeted target. Delight brought a soft burst of laughter from her throat. She glanced at the open door to the bedchamber, but there was no sound from Lyell.

That night at the
Rialla
had always intrigued Kiele. Four new borns in one night; a princess exiled and a princess rewarded; a mistress burned in her bed. Of the four babies, one had been Chiana—insufferable girl. If Kiele shared anything with Pandsala it was an aversion to their half sister.

But was Chiana Roelstra’s daughter? Kiele chuckled silently as she set fire to the letter and watched it burn to ash on a polished brass plate. Afina had not had to repeat that part about the green eyes. Roelstra’s eyes had been that color. And Masul was nearly Roelstra’s height, was he? Kiele bit her lips to keep from laughing aloud.

She pulled out parchment and pen, and wrote a swift letter to Afina thanking her for her letter and asking for more interesting family news to distract her from the strain of organizing the
Rialla.
She ended by expressing a desire for a gift, one of those trinkets Afina often provided to cheer and amuse her—something in shades of black and green. This would be correctly interpreted to mean that the gift was to be Masul himself. As she signed and sealed the letter, another idea struck her. She wrote a second letter, this one a prettily worded invitation for her dear younger sister Chiana to do her the favor of coming to Waes to help her plan this year’s entertainments. That Chiana herself would be providing Kiele’s entertainment caused another chuckle as she folded and sealed the parchment.

Kiele weighed her letter to Moswen in her hand for some moments before burning it, too. With Chiana here, Moswen could not be. And with the thought of her other half sister she nearly laughed aloud—for what could be more hilarious than setting Chiana’s hopes on Halian, only to have him reject her utterly when her lowly birth was made public? Kiele hugged herself as the letter burned, rocking back and form with suppressed mirth.

After a time she sobered. She knew she would have to be cautious. The physical characteristics Afina had mentioned would be a help, no matter what the boy’s true ancestry. Once Kiele had Masul to hand she could judge whether the green eyes and height were matched by reasonable facial resemblance. Lady Palila had had auburn hair; if Masul’s was very black, Kiele could heighten the illusion of his parentage by application of a subtle reddish dye. Proper clothes were essential as well. And jewels. She rummaged in her cases and came up with an amethyst brooch that could be redone as a ring to hint at connection with Princemarch. She could slip it in with jewels due to be reset in time for the
Rialla.
At worst, if the boy was impossible, she would have a new ring.

But if Masul was believable as Roelstra’s son, then even if he was truly baseborn there were endless ways to use him. Chiana’s public mortification when her birth was doubted was worth anything. The burden of proof would be on those who suspected his ancestry to be common—for the only thing certain about that night had been its chaos.

And if the rumors were true, and Masul really was her half brother. . . . Kiele grinned into the mirror, contemplating the delightful prospect of Pandsala ousted from Castle Crag, Pol disinherited, and Rohan humiliated. She pictured Lyell as Masul’s champion and herself as his mentor, teaching him how to be a prince—and through him ruling Princemarch.

She gazed at the two letters. One would go to Einar and bring Masul, the other to Port Adni and bring Chiana. She would keep Masul in hiding until the
Rialla,
school him, attach him to her as his only hope of winning his cause. It would not do to have him meet with Chiana before the princes assembled.

But it all depended on his ability to pass himself off as Roelstra’s son. Kiele regarded her own reflection by candlelight, asking herself if it might be true—and if she wanted it to be true. She decided not. A fake, with reality to hide, would be much easier to control than the real son of the late High Prince. She knew the characteristics of her father’s breeding only too well.

P
ol had dreadful memories of his first trip across the straits between Radzyn and Dorval. His mother had warned him that
faradh’im
and water were in no way compatible. But, wise in the way all eleven-year-old boys think themselves wise, and very conscious of his dignity as the son of the High Prince, Pol had not believed her.

His first step on board ship had taught him otherwise. He remembered turning to look at his parents, who stood on the dock with Aunt Tobin and Uncle Chay, all of them waiting for the inevitable. The ship moved fractionally on the tide. Pol felt himself turn green. He staggered to the rails, was grabbed by a sailor before he could fall overboard and, after being dreadfully sick, fainted. A long day’s misery in a private cabin had been crowned by the indignity of being carried off the ship that night and put immediately to bed.

The next morning his eyes had ceased their imitation of hot coals and his stomach seemed inclined to stay where it belonged. Pol pushed himself upright, every muscle in his body bruised with the violence of his reaction to crossing water, and groaned. A very old man was dozing by the empty hearth. The noise made him start awake from his nap, and a kind smile further wrinkled his face.

“I thought you’d appreciate a good night’s sleep on solid ground before riding up to Graypearl. Feeling better? Yes, I see you are. You’ve freckles on your nose now, not green splotches.”

Thus had he made the acquaintance of Prince Lleyn of Dorval. Pol had felt unequal to the breakfast the old prince proposed, and they had ridden to the great palace where the entire household had assembled to greet the future High Prince. The night’s rest enabled Pol to behave with suitable dignity, and his gratitude had been of such proportions that it had been only a short step to outright worship of the wry old man to whom his parents had entrusted him.

Similar arrangements were made in Radzyn so that Pol and Meath could sleep off the crossing in private before their official arrival at Radzyn Keep. Assisted from the ship to a small house Lord Chaynal kept in the port, they were tucked up between cool sheets and in the morning were greeted by Pol’s cousin Maarken.

“I won’t ask about the crossing,” he said, smiling in sympathy as the pair woke up bleary-eyed. “I remember it all too well myself. But you both look as if you’ll live.”

Meath glanced at him balefully. “I had my doubts last night.” Turning to Pol, he asked, “Are you recovered, my prince?”

“More or less. It never gets any easier, does it?” Pol sighed.

“Never,” Maarken affirmed. “Do you want something to eat?” Their winces made him grin. “All right, stupid question, I know! There are horses outside if you feel capable of sitting a saddle without falling off.”

They did. There was no special welcome from the people of the port, though they paused in their daily routines to greet both Pol and their own young lord. Maarken was the image of his handsome father: tall, athletic, with dark hair and gray eyes like sunlight through a morning mist. He was more lightly built than Chaynal, however; the slender bones of his grandmother’s people had lengthened in him, not thickened. At twenty-six he had fulfilled the promise of height and strength that for now was only hinted at in his young cousin. He also wore six Sunrunner’s rings where Pol had none. As they left the precincts of the town and started down the road between newly sown fields, he caught the boy’s envious look and smiled.

“You’ll have your own one day. I had to wait until after I’d been knighted before Father would let me go to Goddess Keep and Lady Andrade.”

“What’s she like?” Pol asked. “I remember her from when I was little, but not very clearly. And the only thing Meath and Eolie ever say when I ask is that I’ll find out sooner than I want to.”

Meath grinned and shrugged. “It’s only the truth, isn’t it, Maarken?”

The pair were old friends from Maarken’s days as a squire at Lleyn’s court, and they shared a chuckle. The young lord told his cousin, “You’ll have the chance to see for yourself in Waes. It’ll be a real family reunion this year, in fact. Andrade’s bringing Andry with her, and Sorin’s to be knighted by Prince Volog.”

Andry and Sorin were Maarken’s brothers, twenty-year-old twins whose lives had taken divergent paths. Andry had
faradhi
gifts, just as Maarken did, but had seen no reason why he should go through the usual pattern of squire’s training and knighting when all he had ever wanted to be was a Sunrunner. When Sorin was fostered to Volog on Kierst, Andry went to Sioned’s brother, Prince Davvi of Syr. But after only a few years he had successfully pleaded his case to his parents. His progress in earning his rings had confirmed his choice.

Maarken glanced over Pol’s head at Meath. “When do you ride for Goddess Keep?”

“Tomorrow morning, after I’ve paid my respects to your parents.”

“You’ll need an escort, if I’m not mistaken.” He gestured to the saddlebags slung across Meath’s horse. When the older man’s shoulders stiffened, Maarken went on, “Don’t worry, I won’t ask. But even in your misery last night you didn’t let go of them when the rest of the baggage was taken off the ship. That means they’re important, and you’ll need an escort to protect them—and you.”

Meath smiled uneasily. “I didn’t know I’d been so obvious. I don’t want more than a couple of guards, Maarken. More might arouse suspicion.”

Pol eyed his friend. “Then they must be
very
important. Why didn’t you tell me you were going to Goddess Keep? You told Maarken on the sunlight, didn’t you? How am I ever going to be a prince and make the right decisions if nobody ever tells me what’s going on?” Then he shrugged. “You don’t have to say it. I’ll learn what I need to know when I need to know it.”

“Enjoy ignorance, Pol,” Maarken said. “When you’re older, you’ll know more than you want to, sometimes—and they’ll usually be the wrong things, anyway.”