Gropf’s thin mouth smiled at those gowns and he flicked his eyes at the bride when she kissed her husband. Five months pregnant? Sweeting, that’s what the overgown is for! He had no one to tell that his greatest triumph as a cloth cutter now came in front of a patriarch in the Imperial Palace – two years after he’d turned his back on his trade and gone to war.
But he couldn’t stop smiling.
Neither could Wilful Murder, who’d just received the fullest pay day of his adult life and not a sequin in stoppages. He wandered the feast, wagering on anything that anyone would accept a wager on – the time in pater nosters until the bride next kissed the groom was a favourite. He offered odds that the whole company would march the next morning at sunrise.
Mag had a brief and sobering interview with the Captain, and took notes – but the moment the service began and she saw Kaitlin Lanthorn, whom she’d known as a puking, tiny baby not expected to live, now going to the altar to wed a man who was arguably the wealthiest young man of his generation, in front of some of the most famous people in Christendom, she cried. She cried steadily through the service. But she’d made every stitch of linen the bride was wearing, and she’d woven in every scrap of happiness she could draw from the aether. And she’d made a weather working too – her first – that roofed the Outer Court like a bowl of fire.
When the wine began to flow and people walked about freely, the Patriarch came and sat by her. ‘They tell me you cast that,’ he said pleasantly.
She smiled and looked at her feet.
‘These same people tell me you’ve never had an education in the ars magicka.’ He smiled.
She almost said she’d been tutored in Dar-as-Salaam – it was on her lips, one of Harmodius’s memories imprinted in her head. She hadn’t fully assimilated what she’d learned from Harmodius and from the Abbess in the last days of the siege, but she spent time working through what she could remember, every day. Hence her first weather working. But as usual, she found it easiest to be silent.
So she raised her eyes.
They met, eye to eye, for a moment.
The Patriarch broke the contact politely, and shook his head. ‘The north of Alba must be rolling in talents,’ he said.
Mag nodded. ‘It is,’ she agreed.
‘May I invite you to visit the Academy?’ he asked. ‘For more than two thousand years, we have served the needs of men and women with special gifts – hermetical, or scientific, or musical, or scholarly.’
She smiled and looked at her hands. ‘Do you offer a course in embroidery?’ she asked, thinking that he sounded just a little like the dragon on the mountain.
After the boards were cleared, the musicians – who had eaten the dinner and watched the wedding with everyone else – came forward. While they tuned their instruments, the students gave a display of the hermetical art – air bursts of fire, tableaux of the heroes of the past striding across the yard – Saint Aetius fought a great horned irk twice his height, and fought so well that the soldiers roared their applause—
‘I told you that nothing would look as good as a real fight,’ Derkensun said, picking himself off the second-storey floor of the Imperial horse barn. It was not just a new working but a set of nested new workings – it had taken four of them, the two Comnena nuns, Baldesce and Mortirmir. Mortirmir had fought – sparred, at least – with Derkensun, and the working had transmitted their images – subtly altered – to the courtyard below. As the soldiers roared their approval, Mortirmir embraced the Nordikan.
He laughed his great laugh. ‘Bah – it was you witches who made the glamour!’ But he accepted their plaudits, and he and Anna sat with the students for the next course.
Anna put her hand on Derkensun’s arm suddenly – they were being served beautiful custards, obviously the product of the Imperial kitchens. Anna was ignoring the magical shows to enjoy the food – she’d never had enough to eat in in her entire life and the custards—
But a woman in a plain brown overgown had appeared by Megas Ducas’ side. Anna noticed her immediately.
She pointed, her mouth full of delicious custard.
Beside her, Derkensun was grinning at an Ordinary. ‘Is that Quaveh?’ he asked.
The servant bowed. ‘It is, sir.’
‘Anna, this is Quaveh from the other side of Ifriqu’ya!’ he turned. ‘What?’ he asked.
‘Who is that woman?’ Anna asked.
The Megas Ducas was enjoying himself far more than he’d expected to. Some of the drugs worked – and Harmodius was obviously doing his best to hide himself. While the Duke suspected that had to do with the presence of the Patriarch – just a sword’s length away in his throne of ebony and gold – a holiday was a holiday. He was alone.
Or at least, he felt alone.
He was considering sending Toby for his lyre when he caught a hint of scent and then she was at his side.
‘I am incognito,’ declared Princess Irene. ‘Please call me Zoe.’
The Duke girded himself. So much for being alone.
Ser Gavin was sitting with the groom’s party and flirting somewhat automatically with the Lanthorn girls. Ranald Lachlan was staring into darkness and drinking steadily and being a dull companion.
Ser Alison leaned back her chair. She was dressed as a woman – magnificently dressed – except for the knight’s belt at her hips. ‘Who’s that sitting with the Captain?’ she asked.
Gavin did a double-take and smiled knowingly. ‘Well, well,’ he said. He dug an elbow into Ranald, who looked and shrugged.
Ser Michael was an arm’s length away, kissing his wife. He rose for air and caught Gavin’s eye.
‘Get a room,’ said Gavin.
‘We have one,’ said Michael, brightly. ‘What are you and Sauce staring at?’
Kaitlin, who looked like an angel come to earth, leaned forward, being exceptionally careful of her train and her ermine and her jewels and all the other things that didn’t matter as much as the man who had just kissed her, and said, ‘It’s the—’
Ser Giorgios paled, and his new wife had to use years of courtly training not to spit her wine. ‘The Porphyrogenetrix!’ she said. ‘At my wedding!’
Gavin grinned. ‘Good. That’s what I thought, too.’
Ser Thomas appeared and leaned down among them, bowing to – of all people – Sauce. ‘May I have the honour of a dance?’ he asked.
‘Horse or foot?’ Sauce said, automatically. She was ready to fight, and despite her gown and her tight kirtle, she looked like a warrior in that moment.
Bad Tom just laughed. ‘Got you. But—’ he swept a comically exaggerated bow ‘—but I mean it. They’re about to play for dancing. Come and dance.’
‘Why?’ Sauce asked suspiciously. ‘Ain’t you doing Sukey?’
Tom raised an eyebrow. ‘Not for another few hours. Come on, Sauce – come and dance.’ He looked at Gavin. ‘What are you all looking at?’ he asked with his usual air.
‘Not you,’ Gavin said. He indicated the Patriarch’s table without actually pointing.
‘All the big hats,’ Tom agreed.
‘So who’s sitting with the Captain?’ Sauce asked. She rose to her feet and put her hand on Tom’s arm. ‘If you make this a mockery of me, I’ll have your guts out right here, so help me God and all the saints.’
Bad Tom grinned. ‘Are you like this with all the boys?’ he asked. Then his half-mocking grin vanished. ‘Sweet Jesu, it’s the princess.’
‘Got it in one, boyo,’ drawled Sauce.
While Bad Tom was gawking, Ser Jehan and Ser Milus came around the wedding table and each took their turn to kiss the brides and kneel before Kaitlin, slap Michael and Giorgios on the back, and then – Jehan first – crave a dance of Sauce.
‘Am I the only girl you boys know?’ she asked.
Ser Jehan – almost fifty, all muscle and gristle and hard-won chivalry – blushed.
Tom pointed at the Megas Ducas, who was rising with the woman in brown – really, the girl i
n brown – on his arm.
‘Don’t point,’ hissed Gavin.
Jehan smiled. He turned to Ser Milus, and whispered something.
Milus grinned at everyone. ‘Suddenly, everything makes sense,’ he said.
‘Do you dance?’ the Red Knight asked the princess.
She looked at him.
‘I gather that was a foolish question,’ he said. ‘But as you are incognito, I assume I can ask you direct questions and get direct answers, so let’s start small. What are you doing here?’
She rose. ‘Dancing,’ she said. ‘I confess that I’ve never danced in public with a mercenary.’
He nodded and pursed his lips. ‘It’s not as hard as it looks,’ he said.
‘I cannot get over the quality of your Archaic,’ she said, as they moved out from the tables. Just at the edge of the Red Knight’s peripheral vision, the Patriarch started – sat up, turned his head, and said something that caused the young priest next to him to turn his head suddenly too.
He smiled down at her. ‘I learned it right here,’ he said. ‘Or rather, I learned it at home from my tutor, and then practised here.’
‘The Academy?’ she asked.
‘No,’ he said enigmatically.
The musicians obviously knew who she was. There was some discordant fumbling.
‘Can you dance?’ she asked.
‘No,’ he said, smiling brilliantly.
One of the street musicians appeared at his elbow. He had a hat in his hands, and his hands were shaking. ‘My lord. We— What— That is . . . what should we play?’ he finally got out.
The Red Knight – he refused to play the Megas Ducas tonight – bowed to his lady. ‘Whatever the lady asks for,’ he said.
Every Morean within earshot sighed with relief.
Zoe raised her fan to cover most of her face, but allowed the musician some little bit of her smile, which was quite real. ‘Something fast,’ she said. She turned graciously to the brides, who stood by with their new husbands. ‘Anything they ask for. You are the ladies of this merry meeting, not I.’
Kaitlin curtsied and then grinned impishly. ‘Well—’ She grinned at Despoina Helena. ‘We have practised a Morean dance, and it’s fast,’ she said. ‘Let’s dance a Moresca.’
A few couples away Lady Maria gasped, and her son winced.
She leaned over to her son and said, very softly, ‘What have you done?’
He stood his ground. ‘What you told me to do.’
The music was fast. Almost a third of the couples and interested bystanders hurried off the wooden floor as soon as the music began – a combination of Albans who needed to see the dance, and Moreans who feared it.
Bad Tom and Sauce were not one of those retreating couples.
She looked up at him – not as far as other women. ‘You know this?’ she asked.
‘No,’ he said cheerfully. ‘You?’
She shook her head and laughed. ‘Just what I needed,’ she said. ‘A fearless partner.’
Mostly – with a few exceptions – the gentry of Morea and Alba shared some common tastes. The gentry often danced stately processions, in couples, or pairs of couples – while the lower orders usually danced in groups, in rings.
The dance that followed didn’t fit well into either category. It featured pairs who turned with each other – not a horrifying innovation, but a daring one. It was obvious that Lady Kaitlin and Ser Michael knew the dance, and had practised with the Morean couple.
In the best traditions of weddings, and women who loved to dance, the two couples danced all the figures alone, first.
When Giorgios picked Helena up and whirled her in the air, Zoe nodded and a tiny smile played at the corners of her lips. ‘Ahh,’ she said, very softly.
They turned outwards from one another and clapped – their time was perfect – and the music swept them on – around, turn, clap, around, together . . .
Everyone applauded. The servants applauded, even the drunks applauded – they were that good. Kaitlin burst into tears and grinned at her husband. Helena threw her head back in delight.
Sauce looked at Tom. ‘Got that?’
He nodded sharply, like a man going into action. ‘Got it.’
John le Bailli looked down at Mag. ‘Perhaps we should sit this out?’ he attempted.
‘Nonsense,’ she said. ‘Men like you have been finding excuses not to dance since the fall of Troy.’
Harald Derkensun dragged Anna by the hand to the centre of the temporary wooden floor.
‘I can’t dance on the same floor as the Empress!’ Anna protested.
But she pivoted on her toes as she said it.
A dark-eyed young woman with plucked brows and a severe, elegant face cleared her throat just behind Morgan Mortirmir. He had a cup in his hand – he’d thought of asking Anna, but he couldn’t, and he’d obviously been right. She looked very happy with Harald.
He turned and looked at the young woman by his shoulder.
She raised an eyebrow.
He turned back to the dancers and she kicked his ankle lightly. ‘Hey, Plague,’ she said.
His head shot around fast enough to leave his eyebrows behind.
He mustered up every shred of composure he had. ‘Would, um . . would you?’ he asked. He bowed.
She sighed. ‘Blessed Virgin,’ she said, not at all piously, and pretended to follow him onto the dance floor while in fact leading him. ‘If the princess can dance with a barbarian, I suspect it’s all the fashion.’
‘I don’t . . . dance,’ Mortirmir managed to say, as the music began.
‘Tap your foot to the music and look elegant,’ she said, rising on her toes. ‘I’ll do the dancing.’
‘You’re a nun!’ he said.
She frowned. ‘You are an ignorant barbarian,’ she said.
The Patriarch indicated the young Alban mage in training to Father Arnaud. The Hospitaller nodded. The young woman danced beautifully, and the young man was – literally – suffused with light. He lit the centre of the dance floor, and she danced around him as if he was a lantern. It couldn’t last, and eventually he had to move, but the effect was done well and the two laughed together when he stumbled.
But the Patriarch watched the princess as she went by – first in a ring of women, inside a ring of men, and then outside the ring of men after a complex passage of hands, and then the men shot off into the near darkness and the women danced; the women went off and the men danced, more brightly lit by young Mortirmir than by the torches. The two sexes formed chains, and the chains intertwined – leaned to the left, leaned to the right, shot around, with women’s legs and men’s legs flashing out. Then the women leaped and the men caught them.
The Red Knight turned a full circle with the Emperor’s daughter held high above his head.
The Patriarch sat back suddenly, and then frowned, and held up his cup for more wine.
They danced for four hours. They danced until most of the men and women who fought for a living were as sober as when they had started, and as tired as if they’d fought a battle. They’d danced in lines and circles and pairs and fours and eights and every figure known to Alba, Galle, and Morea. Count Zac and his officers demonstrated Eastern dances, and the Red Knight and his officers had to try them. Bad Tom fell full length trying to kick out his legs, and laughed at his own antics, and Sauce clapped her hands and imitated the Easterners only to discover that it was a man’s dance. But Count Zac put an arm around her shoulders and they drank together, and went on to another dance, and later, she went and caught Milus and Jehan by the hands and dragged them across the great circle of watchers – off-duty Ordinaries, female students from the Academy, and other unattached women.
With unerring professional sense, she marched the two knights to a gaggle of Anna’s friends and peers who had made their way in under various pretences.
‘Gentlemen, these women are whores. Ladies, these gentlemen are shy.’ She grinned to show she meant no harm, but one of
the harder women took offence anyway.
‘Who you calling whore, bitch?’ she said.
Sauce smiled. ‘I was one, honey. I know the look.’
‘Really?’ the other woman said. ‘And now what are you?’
‘Now I’m a knight,’ Sauce said. Count Zac was making eyes at her, and she walked away.
Ser Jehan looked down into the deep brown eyes of his sudden new friend. ‘Is she really a knight?’ the girl asked.
‘She really is,’ Ser Jehan agreed. And then he was dancing.
The Red Knight and Zoe danced – on and on. Once they stopped when the Ordinaries came like an avenging army bearing ice – actual ice from the mountains. The Red Knight met them well across the floor, asked who had sent the ice, and then took her some, and watched her eat it.
And again, when the servants came with a bubbly purple wine, he swept her across the floor to see that she had the very first glass.
Everyone commented on how attentive he was.
Wilful Murder sat back and drank his fifteenth jack of cider. He glared at Cully. ‘Thin,’ he said.
Cully rolled his eyes. ‘Not hardly,’ he said. ‘It’s just – different. Sweeter?’ he asked the air.
‘Mark my words,’ Wilful said. ‘He’s going to march us all somewhere horrible in the morning. This whole party was nothing but a cover – we’re going after the false Duke.’
Cully made a face, and shook his head. ‘We won’t have ten men fit for service in the morning,’ he said.
‘Mark my words,’ Wilful said, and belched carefully.
The Red Knight escorted the mysterious Lady Zoe all the way to her door. If he noticed that six heavily scarred Nordikans shadowed them every step through the palace, he didn’t pay them any apparent heed. If he noticed his own Ser Alcaeus or his mother Lady Maria or a long train of Imperial ladies dressed as Ordinaries – all breathless and a few perhaps a little more than breathless – following them along the marbled corridors, he said nothing.