The Palace (Bell Mountain Series #6) (19 page)

“Excuse me, Prester,” a preceptor said, “but how did you learn that the traitor would be coming, too?”

“I have a reliable source of information,” Jod said. What he had was a letter from Constan, who had the information from Gallgoid; but Gallgoid’s name was not mentioned, and Jod knew nothing of him.

“Maybe the king and queen shouldn’t go,” a prester said.

“I’d like to see them hold a coronation without a king!” someone else said, inspiring a general laugh that soon died away.

“I have a mind to stay right here in Durmurot,” Jod said. “Furthermore, I think our rightful First Prester, Lord Orth, ought to leave Obann and join us here, along with everyone else who’s loyal to him and to the king.”

“We’ll lose Obann, my lord. They’ll set up this Goryk Gillow person in Lord Orth’s place. Our king will have a divided kingdom.”

“It might even start a civil war,” said a reciter.

“And what of the pretender—the one they say has been set up in Lintum Forest?” a prester demanded. “What if he’s crowned while King Ryons stays in Durmurot? That would make a mess of things!”

Jod sighed. “That’s why I’m asking your advice, my friends!” he said.

“If the king has already decided to go to the coronation,” said a reciter, “whatever we think doesn’t matter.”

“Which is no reason to stop thinking,” said Jod. But although the chapter deliberated all day long, they were unable to come to a decision.

Gurun knew about the meeting, but hadn’t attended. Instead, she went for a ride with Fnaa, out to some low hills from which she could just make out the blue horizon of the sea. Below, the wide Imperial River began to break up into its many mouths, each one carrying its burden of fresh water to the sea.

The ocean called to her. Somewhere to the north, far away across the water, was her home. Father and mother, and her three annoying brothers, and the wind-swept mounds of Fogo Island—oh, she missed them! An Obannese girl would have wept for homesickness, but Fogo Island girls are taught to save their tears for funerals.

“Look at that, Gurun!” Fnaa cried, pointing. “What do you suppose that is?”

It took her a moment to find what he was pointing to. Down there, emerging from a stand of greenish-yellow reeds beside the riverbank, a beast came out to taste the water. It must have been as big as a horse, but it looked more like a hog. Some of the farmers around Durmurot raised pigs, but this creature was twice as big as the biggest of the boars. And it was slate-grey, not pink or black or spotted. It took one or two sips, suddenly wheeled with startling agility, and dove back into the reeds, where it vanished almost instantly.

“That was something!” Fnaa said, and almost fell off his horse in his excitement. “No wonder nobody likes to go down there anymore!”

But Gurun wasn’t listening. Striding up the grassy slope, straight toward her, was a tall, fair, blue-eyed man in sealskin boots and a brightly colored woolen jacket. He stopped halfway up the hill and spoke to her—spoke in the language of the northern isles.

“Why do you dally here, Gurun,” he said, “when your place is with the king of Obann? He is in Lintum Forest, but you are here, gazing with longing at the sea. But the sea will always be here so you can find it again.”

“Oh, filgya,” answered Gurun, for she knew what the man was, “I will do as you say.” She’d seen him before. Indeed, she was surprised he’d waited so long to show himself again. “I will go to the king.”

“That would be best.”

And then Fnaa reached out and jerked her arm, and there was no more filgya to be seen or heard.

“Gurun, what are you talking about?” the boy said. “Why do you have such a funny look on your face? What do you mean, ‘I will do as you say’? I never said anything!”

She smiled at him. The real King Ryons would have seen the filgya. He’d seen it before. But Fnaa was only Fnaa, and hadn’t seen a thing. The way he stared at her was quite amusing.

“Don’t be afraid,” she said. “It was just my filgya, which I haven’t seen in a long time. He was reminding me that my place is with the king.”

“What are you saying? There’s no one here but you and me!”

“Sometimes we islanders receive messages that we could receive no other way,” Gurun said. “That’s when the filgya speaks. An old man in a place called Jocah’s Creek once told me that the filgya must be much the same thing as an angel—a messenger from God. I think he was right. No one can see or hear the filgya except the one for whom the message is intended. But King Ryons saw the filgya once, when I was with him.”

Fnaa shook his head. “Well, whatever you do,” he said, “don’t tell my mother about this! She’ll think you saw a ghost.”

“You can be perfectly sure a filgya is not a ghost,” Gurun said. “And you must not speak of this to anyone, except Uduqu. He will understand.”

“That’s because he’s a barbarian,” Fnaa said, and shrugged his shoulders. He didn’t understand, but being Fnaa, he just accepted it.

Ellayne and Enith didn’t sleep a wink all night. Enith whimpered for a while until Ellayne made her stop.

“But this is awful!” Enith said. And Ellayne thought, “Jack and I have been in a lot worse scrapes than this!” but didn’t say so.

“Shut up and let me sleep!” one of the outlaws growled. “Or we’ll gag you.”

“What are we going to do?” Enith whispered.

“With our hands tied behind us and all these men around? Not much! But you can be sure my father has the militia out looking for us.”

When daylight finally came, Ellayne could hear the river flowing by but couldn’t see it. A barrier of tall reeds hid it from her sight. For breakfast there was nothing but a little dried meat and water, and Enith was sick. By and by, Ysbott came and squatted in front of them.

“Are you ready to write a letter to your father, girl?” he said.

“I don’t have much choice, do I?” Ellayne answered.

“None at all, miss—none at all.”

Ysbott untied the girls’ hands and made them swing their arms around until they felt right again. Instead of paper and ink, he had a shingle and a stick of charcoal. “Write what I tell you to write, and things will turn out fine for all of us,” he said.

Under his direction, the message Ellayne wrote went something like this:

“Dear Father, Enith and I are all right, and if you pay these men what they ask for, they’ll send us home and not hurt us. But if you try to catch them, or if anyone comes too close, then you’ll never see me again. If you agree, tie a white cloth to a spot over the main gate and wait for the next message. Love, Ellayne.” And on her own, without instruction, she wrote, “There are eight of them, on foot, somewhere beside the river, a night’s journey from the gate.”

“There,” she said.

“Hand it to your friend,” Ysbott said. She gave it to Enith, expecting Enith would be asked to sign it. But Ysbott said, “Read to me what she wrote, missy.” “Oh, no,” Ellayne thought.

But Enith cried, “Please, mister! I—well, I mean—I don’t know how to read,” she lied. It was beautifully done: Ellayne almost believed it herself.

Ysbott shrugged. There were many people in Obann who never learned to read. Ellayne had gambled that none of these outlaws had. Ysbott took the shingle from Enith and stood up again. He glanced at the message, but obviously couldn’t read it and didn’t even try.

“Nelligg,” he said, “take this to the town and see that the baron gets it. But be careful. They’ll be on the lookout for strangers and inclined to be suspicious. Try to leave it near the baron’s door without anyone noticing you.”

“It won’t be easy,” Nelligg said.

“If they do catch you,” Ysbott said, “demand to see the baron, tell them you have a message from his daughter. And that if they don’t let you go unharmed before sundown, she’ll suffer for it. I’m sure they’ll believe you.”

“And the price?”

“The nice, round number we’ve already decided on, of course—one hundred gold pieces.”

“My father doesn’t have that kind of money!” Ellayne cried. She couldn’t help it—the sum was impossible. These fools didn’t know what they were saying.

Ysbott grinned at her. “The bargaining has to start somewhere, miss,” he said. “By heaven, though—you don’t seem to value yourself too highly.”

“I know what things cost,” Ellayne said.

“Let’s hope your father does, too.”

The guards at the gate snapped up Nelligg as soon as he showed his face. He’d been hoping his recent visits to the alehouse as a thirsty trapper would smooth his path, but the baron had given strict orders to arrest and question anyone who wasn’t known to be a citizen of Ninneburky.

Baron Roshay Bault had been up all night, ransacking the town and its environs for his daughter. “I’ll skin her when I find her!” he stormed. “This is the last straw! Every time I turn my back, she runs away on some harebrained adventure. From now on I’ll shackle her to her bedpost.”

Vannett was busy trying to console Nywed and Lanora. Enith, after all, was missing, too.

“How can you be so calm, Baroness?” wondered the cook, after a bout of weeping that had left her red-eyed with moist patches on her apron. Nywed took it better, although she looked so pale that Vannett worried she might suddenly faint.

“Ellayne is under God’s protection, Lanora—and I know it,” Vannett said. “Besides, one hysterical woman in this kitchen is enough. But we would do better to pray together.” She made the women follow her into the parlor, where she and Nywed prayed. Lanora tried to, but said it was no good without a prester to lead them. So old Prester Ashrof was sent for, and he was a comfort to them.

Nelligg and his message were presented to the baron at the guardhouse by the gate. Roshay read the writing on the shingle while two militiamen held the outlaw without taking any trouble to be gentle.

“Did you see my daughter write this?” Roshay, of course, recognized Ellayne’s handwriting.

“Yes, sir,” Nelligg said. Ysbott had cautioned him not to say too much.

“Do you know what the message says?”

“More or less. But I can’t read.”

“I’ll hang you here and now,” said the baron, “if you don’t tell me where my daughter is.”

“Well, sir, if anything like that happens to me, that’ll be the end for the girls. But for a hundred gold spearmen you can have them back, both of ’em, safe and sound. Let me go, and I’ll take your answer back to my mates. There ain’t nothing else you can do, and I guess you know it.”