Two to Conquer (28 page)

Bard watched, standing in the paxman’s place behind his father’s throne, as the formalities and the setting of truthspell took place.

“Geremy Hastur,” said Dom Rafael, “since my son is to be safely returned to me, I declare you free to return to your father’s kingdom, or wherever you choose to go, with your wife, who is my subject, and your son, and your vassals, and all that is yours. Furthermore, as a mark of the esteem in which my lady wife holds your lady, if your wife’s waiting-women wish to accompany the lady Ginevra to her new home, they are free to do so, if they have leave from their own fathers.”

Geremy bowed and made a short and courteous speech thanking Dom Rafael and reassuring him of his gratitude for his kind hospitality. The irony was heavy-handed enough so that the truthspell light faltered on his face, but it was not worth taking issue. Courtesy, Bard thought wryly, was mostly lies anyhow.

“Geremy, you are free, if you will, to leave your son to be fostered in my house. His mother’s father is my loyal man, and I give you my personal assurance that he will be brought up in all respects as my own son, and as a companion to my grandson.”

Geremy thanked him courteously and declined that his son was too young to be parted from his mother, being as yet unweaned, and that Ginevra had a fancy to nurse him herself.

Varzil stepped forward. “And I have come,” he said, “in the name of Carolin, High King at Thendara, guardian of Valentine di Asturien, rightful king of Asturias and overlord of all these lands, to return Alaric di Asturien, son of the Regent and Warden of Asturias, to his father. Alaric—?”

Bard drew in his breath, in audible shock. From behind Varzil, a slightly built boy limped forward; his uneven step and twisted shoulders were like a ghastly parody of Geremy’s own; and Bard could not contain himself.

“Father!” he cried out, stepping forward, “Will you let them mock us thus in our own halls? Look what they have done to my brother, in revenge for Geremy’s hurts? I will swear before truthspell that Geremy was hurt by mischance, not by design, and Alaric has not deserved this of Carolin!” He drew his dagger. “Now, by all the gods, Hastur spawn, defend yourself, for
this
time your life is forefeit and it will be no accident! I’ll make good what I should have done to you seven years ago—”

He grabbed Geremy’s shoulder and spun him around.

“Draw your dagger, or I strike you down where you stand!”

“
Cease! I command it
!”

Varzil’s voice was not loud, but it made Bard loosen his grip and fall back from Geremy, pale and sweating. He had not heard command voice for many years from the lips of a trained
laranzu
. Varzil’s slender figure seemed to loom over him, menacing, as Bard’s dagger fell from nerveless fingers.

“Bard di Asturien,” Varzil said, “I do not war on children, nor does Carolin; your accusation is monstrous, and I stand here in the light of truthspell to give you the lie to your face. We told you nothing of Alaric’s ills for fear you would come to exactly this conclusion. We had no hand in Alaric’s laming. Five years ago he fell ill with the muscle fever which ravages so many children in the lake district, and although all of Ardrin’s healers did their best for him, and sent him to Neskaya for healing as soon as he was able to travel—which is why he was not left here to rejoin you when Queen Ariel fled the country, since he was in my care at Neskaya—despite all our best efforts, his leg withered, and his back is weakened. He can walk now with only a leg brace to help him, and he has recovered his powers of speech; so you may ask Alaric himself if he has anything to complain of from our

treatment.”

Bard stared in dismay. So this poor cripple was the fine, strong, manly brother who would help him to lead his armies! He had the feeling that the gods were mocking him.

Dom Rafael held out his arms and Alaric limped forward, into his father’s embrace.

“My dear son!” he said in dismay and consternation, and the boy looked from his father to Varzil in distress.

“Dear Father,” he said. “Truly, what has happened is not the fault of my kinsman Ardrin, and certainly not of the Lord Varzil. When I fell ill, and for many years after, he, and his
leroni
, cared for me night and day. They have been so kind and good to me, neither you nor my mother could have done more.”

“Gods above!” groaned Dom Rafael. “And Ardrin sent me no word? Nor Ariel, when she fled into

exile?”

“I had been sent to Neskaya years before,” Alaric retorted, “and since you never came to court, I did not think that you cared much what befell me! Certainly,” he added, in a detached, ironical way which convinced Bard that, if his brother’s body was crippled, there was certainly nothing wrong with his mind, “you were not so eager to have me back that you would contend very long with Carolin for me. I knew that you would hold your throne for me, at least until you saw me. After that, I was not sure whether you would care to ransom me at all.”

Dom Rafael said loyally, “You are my own dear son, and I welcome you back to the throne I have

claimed for you,” but Bard heard the unspoken part of this,
If you can possibly hold it
, and was sure Alaric could hear it too.

Varzil’s face was composed and compassionate; his eyes lingered on Alaric and Dom Rafael as if he had no thought except for the child and his stricken father. But Bard knew that Varzil, in spite of a very genuine concern for young Alaric, had nevertheless held him back to produce at the moment when it would cause the most confusion and consternation. He had intended to show them all, and as publicly as possible, that the young claimant to the throne of Asturias was no more than a pitiful little cripple!

Bard felt despair and rage—was
this
the strong young warrior who would ride to battle at his side? Yet his heart ached for the little brother he had loved. Whatever his father’s disappointment and his own, Alaric must be feeling it more than either of them! It was inexcusable, to use the boy like this, to show forth the weakness of the Asturian throne! At this moment, had it not been for his knowledge of

diplomatic immunity, he would willingly have strangled Varzil where he stood—yes, and Geremy too!

Yet—he thought, slowly coming to terms with this new knowledge—it could have been worse. Alaric

was lamed, but otherwise he looked healthy and strong, and there was certainly nothing wrong with his mind! Geremy had a healthy son; there was no reason Alaric could not have a dozen. He would not, after all, be the first crippled king to hold a throne; and, after all, he had a loyal brother to command his armies.

I am not ambitious toward his throne
, Bard thought.
I have no wit, nor yet skill, to govern; I would
rather be the king’s commander than the king
! He met Alaric’s eyes and smiled.

Dom Rafael too had recovered his equilibrium. He rose from his presence seat and said, “In token that I reigned here only as regent, my son, I yield this place to you as rightful King of Asturias. My son and my lord, I beg you to take this place.”

The boy’s cheeks stained with color, but he had been well trained in protocol. When his father knelt at his feet, proffering his sword, he said, “I beg you to rise, Father, and take your sword, as regent and warden of this realm, until I have reached years of manhood.”

Dom Rafael rose, taking his place three steps behind the throne.

“My brother,” Alaric said, looking at Bard, “I have been told that you are commander of the armies of Asturias.”

Bard bent the knee before the boy and said, “I am here to serve you, my brother and my lord.”

Alaric smiled, for the first time since he had stepped out from behind Varzil, and the smile was like a sun coming out and warming Bard’s heart.

“I do not ask you for your sword, dear brother. I beg you to keep it in defense of this realm; may it be drawn only against my enemies. I name you first man in this realm after our father the Lord Regent, and I will think soon of some way to reward you.”

Bard said briefly that his brother’s favor was reward enough. He had hated this kind of ceremony, ever since he had been a boy in the king’s house; he stepped back, grateful that at least he had not made a fool out of himself by tripping over something.

Alaric said, “And now, kinsman Varzil, I know you were entrusted with a diplomatic mission which, quite rightly, you did not confide to a child. Will you now reveal it to the throne of Asturias, and to my father and Regent?”

Dom Rafael seconded the request. “I welcome Carolin’s embassy,” he said, “but would it be possible to hold it in a room more suited to this conference than this throne room where we must all stand about in ceremonial attitudes, waiting upon formalities?”

“I should be honored,” Varzil said, “and I am willing to dispense with truthspell if you are; the matters to be discussed are not facts, but attitudes, claims, opinions and ethical considerations. Truthspell has no validity over honest differences of opinion where each side believes itself in the right.”

Dom Rafael said ceremoniously, “This is true. By your leave, then, cousin, we will dismiss the
leronis
and her work, and meet again within the hour in my private drawing room, if that is not too informal for you, cousin. I offer more comfort, not any intended slight of the importance of your mission.”

“I shall welcome informality and privacy,” Varzil said. When the Hastur embassage had temporarily withdrawn, Dom Rafael and his sons delayed for a moment before leaving the presence chamber.

“Alaric, my son, you need not sit through the conference if it would weary you!”

“Father, by your leave, I will stay,” Alaric said. “You are my regent and guardian, and I will defer to your judgment till I am declared a man, and after, too, no doubt, for many years. But I am old enough to understand these matters, and if I am to govern one day, I had better know what statecraft you intend.”

Bard and Dom Rafael exchanged glances of approval.

“Stay by all means, your highness.” Dom Rafael used the very formal phrase
va‘ Altezu
, used only to a superior and one very near the throne. Bard knew that his father was acknowledging the boy as an adult, though he had not— quite—arrived at the age for legal manhood. Alaric might look like a sick child, but there was little question in either mind that he had the maturity to take his place as a man.

In Dom Rafael’s private study they gathered again, around a table, and Dom Rafael sent for a servant to pour wine for them all. When the servant had withdrawn again Varzil said, “By your leave, Dom

Rafael, and you, Highness,” he added formally to Alaric, his tone quite in contrast to the affectionate informality he had shown Alaric before, “I am entrusted by Carolin of Thendara with a mission. I had intended to bring a Voice, that you might hear Carolin’s very words. But, by your leave, I will dispense with this. I am Carolin’s ally and his friend; I am Keeper of Neskaya Tower. And I have signed with him, for Neskaya, the Compact we now ask you to keep. As you know, Neskaya was destroyed by fire-bombing, a generation ago; and when Carolin Hastur had it rebuilt, we agreed upon the Compact. He did not require it of me as a sovereign lord, but requested it of me as a man of reason, and I was glad to do so.”

“What is this Compact of which you speak?” asked Dom Rafael.

Varzil did not answer directly. Instead he said, “The Hundred Kingdoms are torn apart, every year, by foolish and fratricidal wars; your strife with Queen Ariel for the throne of Asturias is only one. Carolin of Thendara is willing to recognize the house of Rafael di Asturien as rightfully warden of this realm, and Queen Ariel stands ready to withdraw, for herself and her son, any claim to this throne, if you sign the Compact.”

“I grant the generosity of the concession,” Dom Rafael said, “but I have no wish for Durraman’s

bargain, when he bought the donkey. I must know the precise nature of this Compact, cousin, before I agree to it.”

“The Compact states that we will use no weapons of sorcery in war,” Varzil said. “Perhaps war is inevitable among men; I confess that I do not know. Carolin and I are working for a day when all these lands will be united in peace. Meanwhile, we ask you to unite with us in a sacred pledge that fighting shall be done honorably by soldiers who go into battle and risk their own lives, not by coward’s weapons to fling sorcery and chaos upon women and children, to burn forests and ravage towns and farmlands. We ask that you outlaw, within your realm, all weapons which go beyond the arm’s reach of the man who wields them, so that fighting may be honorable and equal, and not endanger the innocent with evil weapons which strike from afar.”

Dom Rafael said, “You cannot possibly be serious!” He stared at Varzil in disbelief. “What insanity is this? Are we to march to war with swordsmen alone, while our enemies fall upon us with arrows and clingfire, bombs and sorcery? Dom Varzil, I am reluctant to think you a madman, but do you truly think war is a game of
castles
, played by women and children with dice for cakes or pennies? Do you truly think that any sane man would listen for a moment to such an idea?”

Varzil’s calm, handsome face was wholly serious. “I give you my word, in all honesty. I mean what I say, and there are many small kingdoms that have already signed the Compact with King Carolin and the Hasturs. Coward’s weapons, and
laran
warfare, are to be completely outlawed. We cannot prevent war, not in the present state of our world. But we can keep it within bounds, keep war from destroying croplands and forests, prevent such weapons as the evil that ravaged Hali nine years ago, where

children swelled and sickened of the disease that turns their blood to water, because they had played in forests where the leaves had been destroyed with bonewater dust… The lands there are still unlivable, Dom Rafael, and may be so in the times of young Alaric’s grandchildren! War is a contest, Dom Rafael.

It could, indeed, be settled by a throw of the dice, or a game of castles. The rules of warfare are not decreed by the gods, that we must go on to greater and greater weapons which will destroy all of us one day, victor and vanquished alike. Before that day comes, why not limit it to such weapons as can be used with honor for all?”