King Kelson's Bride
“To Kelsonous to anaxio Ierei, to timion kai panagion Soma kai Aima tou Kyrios kai Theou kai Soteros emon Iesou Christou. . . . ”
“The servant of God Kelson receives the Body and Blood of our Lord and God and Savior, Jesus Christ,” Mátyás translated in a soft undertone, “unto the remission of sins and unto Eternal Life.”
The form and words might be different, but Kelson had no doubt that the sacrament was the same—as was the sense of peace that descended upon him as Alpheios tipped the contents of the spoon into his mouth. As he swallowed, he thanked God for the peace conferred by the sacrament and also for the hope of a different kind of peace, between these two lands. The lingering comfort of that peace remained with him as Mátyás accompanied him back to his place with Arilan and the others.
But that peace did not prevail beyond the church doors. As the clergy and royal party emerged into the brilliant sunlight, to joyous cheers and shrill ululations from the waiting crowds lining the plaza before Hagia Iób, Kelson saw Liam’s glance flick to their right, back along the extension of the Avenue des Rois that led to the Field of Kings, with its sea of pyramids and tombs.
There, behind a line of Circassian guards, lay the spectacle that Kelson had been at such pains to keep from mind during Communion, both far less and far more than he had expected. Still adorned in the finery they had worn to killijálay, as trusted members of the king’s court, Mahael and Branyng seemed to stand erect and motionless beside the gates to the vast necropolis, heads lolling onto their breasts. Their long robes concealed the stakes upon which they had been impaled. Teymuraz stood within the gate between two guards, flanked by the dead men, head bowed like theirs. Kelson was glad he could not see any of the faces clearly.
“Bring my uncle,” Liam said to a waiting guard, turning his back on the spectacle as he strode purposefully back toward his white stallion, accepting a leg up from a waiting attendant. “And you,” he added, with a nod toward a guard captain mounted on a fine bay. “Give the loan of your mount to my friend, the King of Gwynedd. I would have him ride at my right hand, so to do him honor.”
The first guard headed off immediately to do Liam’s bidding, and the captain swung down from his bay, bringing it around smartly so that Kelson could mount. But just as he was settling into the saddle, letting attendants adjust his heavy mantle, a commotion exploded far behind them, within the gateway to the necropolis.
“Stop him!” someone screamed, on the tide of shouts of alarm.
As Kelson peered urgently in the direction of the growing uproar, he saw the Circassian guards beside the gate bowling back from a blaze of errant magic brighter than the sun, centered on Teymuraz, who bolted from between the bodies of his two dead co-conspirators and made for the heart of the necropolis.
“The Nikolaseum!” Liam cried, wrenching off his diadem and tossing it to a guard. “He’s going for the Portal!”
Clapping heels to his mount, Liam took off in pursuit, scattering attendants and struggling to shed his heavy ceremonial robe as he went. Kelson was close behind, bending low over his horse’s neck and juggling his crown until he could get it safely looped over one arm. Screaming people parted before them, and more mounted men fell in behind.
The cobbled avenue stretched the length of Hagia Iób before passing through the gate to the Field of Kings. The horses’ steel-shod hooves slipped and skittered on the slick cobbles, threatening spills potentially deadly for man and beast, but they dared not slow lest their quarry make good his escape. At the gate ahead, the guards were picking themselves up, and a few had sufficiently recovered their wits to take up pursuit on foot, but there could be little doubt that Teymuraz’s goal was, indeed, the Nikolaseum—and freedom, if he reached the Portal there.
“Teymuraz, stop!” Liam shouted. “Damn you, stop!”
They plunged past the bodies of Mahael and Branyng, through the gate of the necropolis—and gained better footing by shifting to the grass on either side of the cobbled avenue—but the Nikolaseum was still far ahead, and Teymuraz was pounding ever closer to its beckoning doorway. As they galloped past the pursuing guards, Kelson considered trying to stop Liam’s wayward uncle with magic of his own, but it was futile even to contemplate proper focus of such magic from the back of a plunging horse.
Just that bit too far ahead of them, Teymuraz gained the steps to the Nikolaseum and lurched up them two at a time, plunging into the shadows of the doorway with a little cry of triumph. By the time Kelson and Liam got there, throwing themselves from their horses to scramble after, the memorial was as empty and as silent as the tomb it was.
“Damn and double damn!” Liam gasped, sobbing for breath as he bent to brace hands on knees, gulping in great lungsful of the cooler air inside.
Kelson could only stand panting beside him, bleakly scanning the empty chamber as he leaned both hands on one of the carved drums at the foot of Nikola’s tomb. All at once, the future that so recently had looked so bright for Torenth had become shadowed by the dark prospect of future treachery that would not relent until either Teymuraz or Liam was dead.
Suddenly stifling under his heavy mantle, Kelson wrenched at its neck fastening and shed it in a stiff pool of gold and jewelled embroidery and appliqué. He set his crown upon it before sinking to a seat on one of the steps beside the tomb.
“How real a threat is Teymuraz, on his own?” he asked, slicking both hands back across his sweaty face and into his hair. “How much trouble could he be?”
Liam shook his head bleakly. “I do not know. A great deal, I suspect. We shall have to ask Mátyás.”
Still breathing hard, he moved to the head of the tomb and went down on his knees to lay both hands flat on the Portal there, bowing his head. After a moment he looked up again, grimacing as he got to his feet.
“It’s no use. I had hoped I might pick up some resonance of his intended destination, but—” Liam shrugged and cast his gaze unfocused toward the dome above, thinking aloud. “He could have gone to any of at least half a dozen places that I know of—and who knows what other private boltholes he and Mahael might have established in the past four years? Where, even, to start?”
“I would start by sending agents to check the places that you do know of,” Kelson said, as the first of the foot pursuit appeared in the doorway of the Nikolaseum, winded and panting. “He might have been seen. At least that would give us some idea from where to expect his next move.”
“I agree,” Liam said, beckoning one of the guards closer. “We must begin somewhere—and hope that he will not have harmed any witnesses there may have been. Captain, you will coordinate with Count Mátyás to have all known Portals surveyed for passage by the traitor Teymuraz.”
Mátyás himself came bursting through the doorway in time to hear the end of that order, and pulled up breathlessly as he saw only Liam, Kelson, and the handful of guards.
“Out!” he said to the guards, as he staggered up the steps to Nikola’s tomb, and the Portal square at its head. “Seek guidance on a plan of search from Holy Alpheios. I will join you shortly.”
He sank beside the Portal square as the guards left to do his bidding, setting his hands upon the square as Liam had done, then let himself collapse upon it in a dejected sitting position. The labored breathing of the three of them echoed in the vaulted chamber.
“Gone with nary a trace,” Mátyás said. “Why did I not insist that—” He shook his head, still catching his breath. “No matter. It is always better to err on the side of mercy, if one is not certain. To take another’s life . . .”
As he shook his head again, Kelson cast him a faint, somewhat ironic smile. “Is it really true that you have never taken a human life yourself?”
Mátyás shrugged, himself smiling faintly. “Does Branyng count, or does that constitute a group effort?” he replied. “You would admit, I think, that the body count is generally low, among tenders of vines.
“But to answer your direct question, without possibility of ambiguous
wording—no, I have never taken a human life.” He grimaced. “Given the role into which you have thrust me, however, by declaring me Laje’s protector and advisor, I fear that this shall not long be the case—nor should it, when dealing with traitors. And I fear that I did order the death of Count László—though he was a traitor, too. But there are some things worth killing for—and dying for, if need be. We shall hope it does not come to the latter.”
“Amen to that,” Kelson murmured.
He and Liam left the Nikolaseum very shortly, to be met by Morgan and Dhugal and several of the Torenthi lords Kelson had met in the past week, in addition to a contingent of Circassian guards. Liam kept his head high as they fell in with the guards to make their way back out of the Field of Kings. When they had passed between the bodies of Mahael and Branyng, Liam paused to beckon to one of the guard officers.
“I shall send orders regarding the eventual disposition of the bodies,” he said. “Meanwhile, they are to remain where they stand, for the full three days and nights prescribed by law. You will post guards to ensure that this is done. Do you understand?”
The man drew himself to even more rigid attention. “I understand, Sire.”
With a tight nod, Liam turned away to shrug back into his robe of state, to let Holy Alpheios set the crown back on his head. Then, with his hand on the shoulder of King Kelson of Gwynedd, he led a slow foot procession through a wildly cheering throng, back to the quay, where the fleet of state caïques was waiting to whisk them back downriver to the waiting celebrations.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
And let just men eat and drink with thee. . . .
Ecclesiasticus 9:16
News of the betrayal at Hagia Iób, and from within the very bosom of the royal family, ought to have dampened the festivities that followed; but reports of King Kelson’s astonishing response—how he had helped defend Liam-Lajos from treachery, then released the fully empowered padishah from his vassal status and given him back Torenth’s independence—spread even faster than details of the thwarted attack by the royal uncles, or the escape of Teymuraz, or the hushed accounts of Mahael’s justly deserved fate for his treason: impaled like a common criminal before the very gate of the Field of Kings, in the presence of the shades of all his ancestors.
The latter detail made but a grim footnote to the ecstatic reception the two kings received when the official party reached the Quai du Saint-Basile, before the great Cathedral of Saint Constantine. Mátyás was already there, via Portal, but only to report that the first agents to return had nothing to report of Teymuraz’s likely whereabouts.
The procession back to the palace was a joyous affair, even more lavish than the one to the quai that morning, moving but slowly along a processional route now lined by cheering, shouting crowds waving ribbons in the colors of Torenth and casting flowers and palm fronds before the great state carriage. There Kelson now sat at Liam’s side, not as suzerain but as equal. Mátyás rode slightly ahead of Liam’s right-hand carriage door, in demonstration of his loyalty to his royal nephew, and Morgan and Dhugal followed behind the carriage as escort to both kings.
So slow was their progress, because of the press of humanity, that it was mid-afternoon before the cavalcade reached the sprawling forecourt of Furstánaly Palace, where young girls in pastel gowns waited to strew rose petals before the royal party as they dismounted from the carriage. Mátyás briefly withdrew to a small staff room adjacent to a Portal used for official couriers, where his agents had been told to report as they returned with news, but soon returned with only a faint shake of his head as he rejoined the royal party.
The feast had been laid in the hanging gardens to catch the breezes, with long, damask-draped tables sheltering under the shade of silken canopies and groaning under the weight of gold and silver plate. Waiting were the highest ranks of Torenthi nobility, both men and women, who cheered Liam heartily as he passed among them to the dais prepared for him. After pausing to acknowledge their acclaim, he and Kelson retired briefly to shed their heavy ceremonial robes, emerging a short time later in lighter silks, more fitly attired to enjoy what remained of the day and evening. When they had taken their place at the high table, both kings put aside their crowns to recline on cushioned couches in the Eastern manner.
To the accompaniment of lute and drum, flute and lyre, and the intermittent lilt of women’s voices drifting from behind a latticed screen, wave after wave of servants brought forth culinary offerings for the delectation of the noble guests. Kelson had Dhugal, Morgan, and Arilan close beside him; Mátyás and an apparently recovered Ronal Rurik ensconced themselves on Liam’s other side, with a succession of other Torenthi dukes and counts and other courtiers rotating in by turns, to share the royal presence. Princess Morag held separate court from amid the highborn ladies permitted near the high dais, many of whom were veiled in the Eastern manner.
After the first hour, between courses, Liam began receiving petitioners informally at table, vetted by Count Berrhones and attended by his brother, his mother, Rasoul, and Azim. Mátyás disappeared periodically.
Arilan stayed nearby, making himself available for counsel, as had originally been intended, but said little, being aware that his status was now uncertain, in light of Liam’s change in status. In the dusky twilight, as weather mages set tiny spheres of handfire twinkling amid the branches of the trees, Kelson called Dhugal to his side and circulated among the guests. Hardly unexpectedly, much of the talk was of the betrayal of the padishah by his two elder uncles.
“I suppose it must be true, about them having contrived the death of Alroy Arion,” Kelson heard one man say, as he and Dhugal passed by a knot of courtiers intent on a flask of Vezairi ale. “I never did trust Mahael—and Teymuraz may be the worst of the lot. . . .”
Others spoke of Mahael’s fate. One such conversation, overheard en route to the privy, caused Kelson to draw Dhugal into the shadow of a pillar and feign avid interest in a pair of fire-jugglers as he strained to catch details.
“They say he danced very poorly,” one elderly man was murmuring to another, as the pair stripped shreds of flesh from a roast peacock. “If you ask me, the executioners bungled the job.” Both men wore the braided sidelocks and gilded leather wrist gauntlets of Steppes nobles. Their grey beards were braided as well, the moustaches twisted back behind their ears.
“Well, I doubt anyone was expecting an execution at a killijálay,” the second man said, gesturing with a greasy bone. Both were also casting idle scrutiny toward the jugglers as they talked, their appetites apparently unaffected by the topic of conversation. “It takes finesse to impale a man properly, without piercing vital organs right away. Best if the victim’s own struggles do that.”
“True, it’s the struggle that makes for a good dance,” the first man agreed. “And cowards make the best dancers—straining upward on their toes to escape the inescapable. Of course, the length of the stake must be judged with precision. . . .”
Kelson could feel the gorge rising in his throat, and fought down queasiness as he seized Dhugal’s elbow and the pair of them headed toward one of the balconies, gulping for breaths of fresh air.
“Do you suppose those men knew we were listening?” Dhugal asked, when they both had regained their equilibrium. “Surely no one could do what they described.”
“It wouldn’t surprise me,” Kelson murmured.
He was trying not to imagine Mahael’s “dance.” Mind-ripped as Mahael had been, Kelson thought he would have been mostly oblivious to his fate, as his executioners set him in place; he hoped so. Still, it would not have been a quick death.
Not that Gwynedd’s penalties for capital treason were necessarily much quicker. He had seen many a man slowly choke out his life at the end of a rope—and even beheading did not always guarantee a quick end, if the victim flinched or the headsman’s concentration wavered. It had taken three blows to sever Conall’s neck.
Memory of that particular execution, compounded by involuntar
y speculation surrounding Mahael’s final moments, kept Kelson subdued for most of the next hour, though he declined comment when both Dhugal and Morgan remarked at his sobriety. For recollection of Conall had brought attendant memories of Rothana—and of Araxie, to whom he now was pledged in betrothal. He had been able to keep thoughts of both women mostly at bay in the face of the focus of the past few days, but his own fears and sorrows now began to intrude, as fatigue and relief made him start winding down. And interspersed with recollections of both women were increasing worries regarding the next likely moves of Teymuraz, as the twilight deepened and still no word came of the traitor’s whereabouts.
The continuing lack of news put something of a damper on further celebrations, but when full darkness had fallen, Liam dutifully gathered his guests beside the terrace railing looking out to the east, where the domes of the cathedral and churches and even the minarets of the Moorish prayer halls of the city were lit to the rainbow hues of Deryni magic—like what they had seen at Saint-Sasile, but magnified tenfold. The display again brought a smile to Liam’s lips, as he watched with Kelson and Mátyás at his sides, but the smile was no longer that of the innocence of youth. Much had changed in the fortnight since Saint-Sasile.
The celebrations were slated to continue long into the night, but soon after the lights had faded away over Beldour, Liam conferred briefly with Mátyás, then invited Kelson to bring Morgan, Dhugal, and Arilan to an impromptu meeting that Mátyás had arranged, of men he believed loyal to the newly enthroned king. Conspicuously absent were Morag and Liam’s brother—both retired early, it was said, after their ordeals at Hagia Iób. But the Patriarch Alpheios and two of his senior Metropolitans were prominent among the Torenthis, which included Rasoul and several of the royal dukes. Azim was also in attendance. Liam made gracious apology for calling them from the festivities, declaring his intention to present each with a suitable token of his esteem at a later date, then shifted at once into the urgent business of the night.