The King's Deryni (50 page)

One side bore an equal-armed cross with smaller crosslets in the angles of the large cross; the other showed the haloed head of a saint. It could be just about any male saint—he had not thought to ask Sé at the time he was given charge of it—but he wondered whether it was meant to depict St. Camber, the patron of Deryni magic.

He supposed it was safe enough for a Deryni like Sé to wear it openly in the far eastern reaches of the Anvil of the Lord. Alaric had a St. Camber medal of his own back in Rhemuth, left to him by his mother, but he mostly refrained from wearing it because of the reactions it might provoke. Perhaps when he got back, if Sé's spell worked, Alaric could use his own medal in a similar fashion.

His waiting was rewarded a few nights later when, as he had for several nights before, Alaric lay down in his bed and settled into the receptive edges of trance the way Sé had instructed him, cupping the medal in his hand. He was on the verge of slipping into true sleep when he sensed Sé's touch in his mind.

Sé!

Nicely done,
came Sé's response.
We have accomplished our mission, and all is well. We should be back to Cynfyn within the week.

They gave up the bodies?
Alaric asked.

They did. I shall tell you more when I see you.

This is excellent news. May I tell the others?
He had an impression of amusement before the other responded.

Perhaps not the best of plans. While they do already know that you are Deryni, as am I, best not to flaunt your abilities. Some skills are best kept private.

Alaric immediately realized the wisdom of that advice, and sent his agreement.

I shall send a rider ahead when we are a day out from Cynfyn,
Sé informed him.
Then you will have legitimate reason to know of our success, and to ride out to meet us. Until then, stand by each evening, as you have tonight, in case I have need to advise you further—though I do not anticipate such a need. We shall see you soon.

With that, Sé ended the communication, with the wish that his student might sleep well. Alaric, for the first time since they had left, did sleep deeply and dreamlessly, and set about the next day's activities with renewed enthusiasm.

•   •   •

S
EVERAL
days passed without sign of the promised courier, but on the first day of June a lookout atop the castle wall announced the approach of a rider who, to Alaric's delight, proved to be Llion.

“They have the bodies,” he called to Alaric and to Pedur Chandos and his wife as they met him at the gate, though Alaric already knew. “Everyone is well, and they'll be here in another day. I need a bed first, but we can ride out to meet them in the morning.”

Llion declined to be drawn out by Sir Pedur and the other knights concerning exactly how the mission had been accomplished, pleading exhaustion; but when he had wolfed down a hasty meal and duly retired to the apartment that was his when in Cynfyn, Alaric went with him. There, Llion was more than willing to elaborate, at least to Alaric.

“I mayn't speak of this to anyone else,” he said candidly. “In fact, I
cannot
. But as you might have supposed, Sé and Savion were largely responsible. Sigismund and even the duke seemed almost afraid of them. It makes me wonder what power the Anvilers have in the far east.”

Alaric nodded thoughtfully. “I wish I knew more about them. But go on.”

“There's little more I can say. The two stood flanking the queen while she made her request, saying not a word; the ducal court was silent. She appealed to the duke and his retainers as a grieving mother, and pointed out that, while she did not question Sigismund's grief, he had only known Xenia for a couple of years, while Richeldis had known her all her life.”

Alaric shook his head in disbelieving admiration. “The queen is brave, I'll give her that. What did the Arkadians say, when she had made her case?”

Llion raised a droll eyebrow. “What do you think? When she had finished, Count Sigismund exchanged a glance with the duke, then nodded to the queen and said that he certainly would allow them to take the bodies back to Rhemuth.

“And that was it. With so many Deryni in the room, I suspect that there was a great deal more going on, but nothing that I could detect. And Sir Sé declined to comment, later on. That very afternoon, we were escorted to the cathedral and told to wait beside a new wagon that the duke provided. Sé and Savion accompanied Sigismund and a party of Arkadians inside, and they shortly emerged with a brightly painted coffin that was loaded onto the wagon. We left that very afternoon. It was as if they couldn't get us out of there fast enough.”

“Or couldn't get Sé and Savion out of there fast enough,” Alaric muttered. “I wonder what was threatened.”

“I have no idea,” Llion replied. “And I'm not certain I want to know.”

“You said one coffin; I assume the baby was buried with Xenia?”

“So I assume. But I can't imagine that Sé didn't check to make sure.”

“No, he would have checked,” Alaric replied. “In any case, it will be good to meet up with them again tomorrow.”

•   •   •

H
E
and Llion departed just after dawn with an honor guard of fresh troops to escort the queen and her daughter, and met the royal party a few hours out from Cynfyn. That night, the coffin rested in the castle's chapel, where the queen summoned the household and asked Father Creoda to lead them in prayers for the deceased. Before Alaric could join the others, Sé quietly drew him apart. Savion was waiting in the yard with their horses, so Alaric knew the conversation would be brief.

“I imagine you'll want your medal back,” he murmured, pulling its chain from beneath his tunic and taking it off.

“Thank you, I do.” Sé closed the medal and chain in his hand and nodded to Alaric. “You did well—and you learn very quickly. You should find this skill useful in the future. And I am glad we were able to serve the queen in this way.”

Alaric gave the Deryni knight a faint smile. “I don't suppose you're ever going to tell me how you managed to persuade the duke to let Xenia go.”

“I don't suppose I am.” Sé's answering smile confirmed that further questioning would be pointless. “But, time enough for such matters when you're grown,” he went on, laying a hand on Alaric's shoulder in farewell. “For now, I am well pleased with your progress.” His hand tightened momentarily on Alaric's shoulder, then released him. “God keep you, my young friend. Until next time.”

With that, he was striding into the night and the torchlight near where Savion waited with the horses, to quickly disappear into the night.

•   •   •

T
HE
recovery party lingered at Cynfyn for two days more, to allow the queen and Alazais to rest, for they had learned on their return that there now was no reason to hasten back to the capital. In Alaric's absence, a messenger had arrived with word that the king was returned to Gwynedd with his new wife, who had entered Rhemuth at the center of a grand procession that wound its way up to the cathedral for a blessing of the couple and the crowning of Gwynedd's new queen, who had taken the Gwyneddan form of her name at her coronation: Jehana.

“Too late to worry about that now,” the old queen said to Jamyl, on hearing the news. “Sadly, we have missed that celebration—and my return with the body of the king's sister will hardly be cause for the same kind of rejoicing. Meeting my new daughter-in-law can wait a few more days.”

Alaric knelt with them for prayers that last evening, remembering the departed Xenia, only a few years older than himself, and mourning her sacrifice on the altar of political expediency. Alaric's grandfather Keryell and his Uncle Ahern lay beneath the floor here at Cynfyn: two Deryni earls to guard the dead princess. Alaric had never known either of them, but his mother had told him of the legacy they had left him. Before God, he vowed to be worthy of that legacy, and to serve the king to the best of his ability.

“Ye have condemned and killed the just . . .”

—JAMES 5:6

T
HEY
departed for Rhemuth the next day, along with Sir Jovett and half a dozen of his knights who had assisted in the mission into Torenth. Thanks to the industry of Zoë and her mother-in-law during their absence, all in the party wore black mourning bands on their sword arms. Xenia's brightly painted coffin bore a black pall, now dusty from their journey. The horses pulling the funeral wagon sported black plumes in their headstalls.

The night before they were to reach Rhemuth, Jamyl sent a fast courier ahead to inform the king of their coming, and their success. The next day, just at noon, they approached the city walls and eastern gate to be met by an honor guard of Haldane lancers, with black crape banding their sword arms and more black fluttering from their lances.

The lancers formed up to either side of the gate, dipping their black-pennoned lances in salute as the wagon bearing their dead princess passed between their ranks. The king and his bride of only a few weeks awaited their arrival just before the gates, along with his remaining sister, his brother, and his uncle, all of them in blackest mourning. Both sovereigns wore their crowns, but no other adornment. As the cortege approached them, the dowager queen rode out from the rest and urged her mount toward her son, with Jamyl and Alaric closely following. She nodded to Brion and then to Jehana as she drew rein.

“We have returned with your sister and her child,” she said to her son, head held high. “And dear Jehana, I am so sorry not to have been here to welcome you, but it did not seem fitting that a Haldane princess should lie in a foreign grave. When you are become a mother, you will understand.”

“I do understand, madame,” Jehana said softly, with a deep bow in the saddle. “The king was wise to send you on this mission. Who better than a mother, to appeal to those who kept her?”

“I did
choose
to go,” Richeldis replied archly, with an inclination of her head. “My son did not
send
me. But you are right that he was wise not to try to stop me.” Smiling, she leaned across to gently clasp Jehana's forearm. “You will learn these things in time, my dear. It is ill advised to stand between a queen and her children.” She cast a weary smile at her other two children, at Nigel and Silke silently sitting their horses, then returned her attention to her eldest son.

“I hope our arrival will not dampen the joy of your wedding festivities. I ask only that your sister be accorded the honors due her royal status, so we may lay her to rest with her kin.”

“Arrangements have already been made,” Brion replied. “The archbishop will come to the palace tomorrow morning to consult with you regarding your wishes.” He turned his attention to Jamyl, waiting attentively at the dowager queen's side. “And thank you for your services, Sir Jamyl. It cannot have been easy.”

Jamyl only inclined his head in acknowledgment, as did Alaric, when the king nodded to him. His inclination was to say nothing of the assistance they had received from Sé and Savion, for he did not know how much Jamyl was prepared to tell. Jamyl seemed not to have any problem with Deryni, but would he protect Sé?

For now, though, that hardly mattered, because the king was kneeing his horse aside to allow the wagon catafalque to precede him.

Men with muffled drums fell in ahead of the wagon, beating out a slow march. Just inside the gates, a crucifer and thurifer and a score of green-robed monks from the cathedral chapter joined the procession, intoning prayers for the dead princess and her infant daughter.

The somber sounds accompanied them as the cortege made its slow way through the city and into the castle yard, where eight black-clad knights waited to carry the coffin into the chapel royal. There it would lie overnight to allow members of the royal household to pay their respects, before being transported back to the cathedral for a state funeral.

They buried Xenia and her daughter two days later, following a solemn Requiem Mass celebrated by the archbishop to commemorate her short life and that of her child. They laid her to rest in the cathedral crypt, beneath a ledger stone beside the sarcophagus that held the body of her father, King Donal, and near the bodies of brothers and sisters who had died before her. Alaric and Llion attended with the others involved in the recovery of the body, given an honored place near the family mourners.

Dinner that night was subdued, to no one's surprise. Alaric attended the old queen and Princess Silke, as he had for several years now, and the Redfearn twins continued their attendance on the king and his new queen.

Afterward, Prys and Airey followed Alaric to his quarters and there proceeded to tell him of their adventures of the past several months, and the latest gossip at court. The pair had become quite smitten with their new royal mistress during the wedding festivities in Bremagne and the journey home, as were the other squires and pages at court, and Alaric soon found himself quite prepared to let himself get caught up in their adulation for the new queen.

“She's beautiful and kind, and she likes to hunt . . . ,” Airey said dreamily.

“Aye, and she loves to dance,” Prys chimed in. “Her ladies are organizing dancing lessons for the squires and pages—and the knights, too, if they want to come. She brought about eight ladies, you know, and most of them are young and beautiful!”

Alaric, remembering what he had seen of the court at Millefleurs, could certainly believe that. He hoped the pretty Fallonese girl was not among them, though. She would be a complication he definitely did not need. For now, celibacy seemed by far the best choice.

“She's brought a couple of sisters, too,” Airey added. “Religious ones, you know. You'll see them around, looking like crows in their black habits. I don't know what order, but they seem awfully somber, even though they're young. Well, one's young. The other is, well, older. Mathilde and Clemence, they're called.”

“And there's a young priest, too,” Prys chimed in. “His name is Father Aimone. I think he's sort of Llion's age, but he seems very strict. He says Mass for the new queen and her household every morning, first thing. I think he'd like all the squires and pages to attend, too, at least the ones who serve the queen, but Duke Richard says that isn't necessary for future knights. He says once a week is enough.”

“I'd keep a low profile, if I were you,” Airey said. “I don't think he much likes Deryni.”

Alaric mostly listened to all of this information, and resolved to keep an open mind and decide for himself about the new queen's household.

Meanwhile, once Jovett and his knights set out for Cynfyn, the day after Xenia's funeral, Alaric tried to settle back into what had become the new normal. Llion escorted Alazais back to Morganhall to visit their daughter, but returned after only a few days, ready to resume his duties.

Training of the squires and pages continued, for Duke Richard still was in charge of that, but the king seemed sometimes preoccupied, seen often in the company of his new bride on long rides through the countryside, strolling in the gardens, sometimes simply disappearing for hours at a time in his apartments.

In the lengthening summer evenings, Alaric found himself continuing to serve the old queen, now partnered with a pair of younger pages whose diffidence told him that they were well aware of who and what he was. And while Airey and Prys continued to be friendly to him, some of the other squires had become more reserved.

“They're jealous because you got to go on the mission to Torenth,” Airey told him.

“But I didn't go to Torenth; I only went to Lendour, my own county.”

“You still were treated like a man,” Prys replied. “They're still whacking at pells and sweating in the practice yard.”

“But, so am I. So is Prince Nigel, so is the king.”

“That's true,” Airey admitted. “But you still got to go on a real mission, doing important work.”

“That's because they needed my Lendour men,” Alaric said. “Once we got to Cynfyn, they picked up a Lendouri escort and I got left behind with my cousins and my sister.”

“But you did get to go to Cynfyn,” Prys insisted.

Alaric could only sigh and shake his head, for the pair did not yet understand what Alaric himself was fast learning: that even nobles sometimes were called upon only to wait.

The king's attitude and behavior also were somewhat different, now that he was a married man. Alaric had expected some changes, but some of them still surprised him. The royal couple usually dined in the great hall with the court, presiding over divers entertainments and dancing into the darkness, but sometimes they took their meals in their apartments while Duke Richard presided with the dowager queen. Alaric was assured by Llion that this was normal behavior for newlyweds, but he missed some of the personal time he had spent with the king before.

Owing to the death of Princess Xenia, the king's birthday court was somewhat subdued that year, even with a new queen at his side, but the associated tournament was held as scheduled. Alaric duly attended, setting rings for the pages and squires and handling lances. And he squired for the king when he took to the field to demonstrate his prowess before his new wife. But he decided he would not ride against the other squires this time.

“You could best most of them, you know,” Llion said, “even the ones nearly ready for knighthood.”

“I probably could.”

“Then, why not compete?”

“Well, let's just say that I prefer to lie low for a while.”

“Because . . . ?”

“Because since we returned, I've sensed . . . some resentment, that I was allowed to help lead the recovery mission. Airey and Prys have noticed it.”

“But you did
not
go with the king to his wedding,” Llion pointed out.

“No, but I was sent on a very adult mission. It's true that they were my men being used, and that I was only providing the assistance appropriate from the Earl of Lendour, but there have been some remarks among a few of the older squires.”

“From whom?”

“I'd rather not say.”

Llion let out a heavy sigh. “I appreciate your discretion, but I think Duke Richard should be aware of such behavior.”

“I can handle it, Llion.”

“I'm sure you can. But I hope you aren't thinking to use your powers to do it.”

“I won't do that.”

“You're certain?”

Alaric shrugged and bit back a grudging grimace. “I won't do anything. At least nothing
overt
.”

“See that you don't,” came Llion's curt reply.

•   •   •

N
O
provisions were made that summer for Alaric to visit his lands of Corwyn or Lendour, for he had returned only recently from Lendour, and had spent time in Corwyn the previous year. Instead, late in July, he rode to Morganhall with Llion, for a brief outing that could incite no further resentment among his fellow squires, who likewise were allowed visits home during the summer months.

During their six weeks away from the capital, he and Llion also rode up to Culdi to visit Alaric's McLain cousins, taking Bronwyn with them. Kevin, now sixteen, had recently returned from more than a year at the court of the Duke of Claibourne, squiring for Duke Ewan and honing his fighting skills against Ewan's northern knights. Duncan was still at home, continuing his military training with his father's knights but also studying with his tutors and thinking increasingly about a priestly vocation.

“I'm only thinking about it,” he told Alaric, during one of their private conversations up on the roof leads one night. “I'm only a second son, so I don't have to worry about one day inheriting a title and responsibilities. And there's this pull, this yearning toward . . . I'm not sure what. But I do know that when I'm at prayer, or even just sitting in the chapel by myself, I'm . . . more than content. Father Geordan and I talk.”

“But he doesn't know what you are,” Alaric said softly. “You know it's forbidden for our kind.”

Duncan shrugged. “Those are the laws of men, not God's law. There used to be Deryni priests. Somehow, I don't think God cares about such restrictions. Do you really think that He would reject the service of a Deryni priest whom He has called to His service?”

“I would hope not,” Alaric replied. “But be careful, Duncan.”

Meanwhile, Alaric joined in the training regimen set for Kevin and Duncan, made that much more challenging by the addition of Tesselin as a weapons master and sparring partner. Alaric fought matches against all three during his stay in Culdi, and acquitted himself well.

“That was very well fought,” Duke Jared told him, after watching a particularly intense exchange with Kevin, who was three years older, and nearly a head taller. “You're fighting well beyond your age. Who has been your sword-master of late?”