The Bastard Prince
At their nods, he rose.
“Very well, then. Tammaron, please fetch Master James and have him prepare a sleeping draught for her Highness.”
A short while later, as Rhysel brushed out the queen’s hair in preparation for retiring, Archbishop Hubert came with one of the Court physicians to inform the queen that her husband was dead. Rhysel guessed their mission as they came into the room and held tightly to the queen’s hand as she rose to receive them—and knew that the queen guessed, even before Hubert opened his mouth. Michaela blanched and sat back down again, covering her face with the hand Rhysel was not holding, and Rhysel damped the pain as the inexorable words conveyed their dread message.
“It is not believed that he suffered greatly, my lady,” Hubert said quietly. “He simply was not strong enough to survive the surgery. I am very sorry. I’ve had Master James prepare you a sleeping draught. I strongly recommend that you drink it—for the sake of the child you carry, if not for your own. In the morning, if you wish, I—shall allow you to inform young Owain. He is king now, of course, and there are proclamations to be drafted, ceremonies to be performed, but I believe there is no need to wake him at this hour.”
As Michaela managed a jerky nod, saying nothing, Rhysel took the cup from the court physician and set it in the queen’s hand, urging her to drink. The queen obeyed without demur and numbly allowed herself to be put to bed. A quarter hour later she had escaped into sleep. The tears would come with the morning.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
His sons come to honour, and he knoweth it not.
—Job 14:21
Michaela woke to the slow, leaden tolling of church bells and a dull ache of heart that knew for whom they tolled. Rhysel lay beside her, fully clothed, faithful guardian through the night. The younger woman sat up as Michaela stirred, gently setting a hand on her wrist.
“Mika, you must be strong,” she whispered.
Michaela drew a deep breath and let it out in a heavy sigh, grateful for the human intimacy of the other’s mere presence at such a time.
“I feel numb inside,” she replied. “I know he’s gone, but I can hardly feel it. Is that your doing?”
Gravely Rhysel nodded.
“You have a child on the way and another who will need you today, especially. I have never lost a husband, but I was seven when my father died.” She gave a wan smile. “When I learned of it, I had only my grief to contend with, devastating though that was. I did not become a king as well.”
Michaela could feel tears welling in her eyes, but she blinked them back and sniffled resolutely, wiping her free hand across her eyes as she sat up.
“I’ll be all right,” she whispered. “You’d better help me dress. I want to be ready when they let me go to Owain. You don’t think he’ll have guessed, from the bells?”
Rhysel shook her head. “He’s very young, and there have been ample bells these past few days.”
Half an hour later, dressed in deepest mourning, Michaela sat waiting among her black-clad ladies in the shade of the solar, eyes downcast, turning Rhysem’s marriage ring on her finger. She would have preferred to go to her son informally, with her hair tumbled loose and free the way he liked it, but protocol required otherwise of queens, especially on such a day. Under Lady Estellan’s tight-lipped direction, Rhysel had been obliged to scrape back the queen’s wheaten mane in a tight knot before covering it with the mandatory widow’s coif and veil. Michaela made no protest to this, but stubbornly declined the prescribed jeweled diadem in favor of a light circlet of gold and silver roses—because that was Owain’s favorite.
The waiting now began. While Michaela’s women sat murmuring prayers all around her, Rhysel settled quietly at her feet, her head resting lightly against the queen’s knee as she continued to urge calm and serenity—for she would not be allowed to accompany the queen to the new little king’s apartments.
A knock at an outer door brought Rhysel to her feet and set Lady Estellan hurrying to answer it. Shortly she returned with the queen’s two visitors of the night before, plus Tammaron, Richard Murdoch, and Father Secorim. As the archbishop and Secorim bowed, somber and correct in their ecclesiastical robes, the physician hung back to study his royal patient. Tammaron and Richard came to kneel and kiss the queen’s hand.
“Your Highness, our condolences this morning come on behalf of the Regency Council,” Hubert said. “Did your Highness spend a quiet night?”
“I am well enough, your Grace,” she said, not meeting his gaze. “May I see my son now?”
“If Master James feels you are strong enough.”
Michaela sighed as the physician silently came to clasp her wrist. After a moment he released her and lightly felt her forehead.
“Her pulse is steady, your Grace. She seems composed enough, but this will be a difficult day. Your Highness, may I recommend something to ease you? Nothing as strong as last night. I know you would have your wits about you when you speak to the King’s Grace.”
“I thank you, no, Master James,” she said, rising purposefully. “Your Grace, I would go now to my son.”
Only Tammaron’s wife, Lady Nieve, was allowed to accompany her as the regents escorted her to the nursery apartments occupied by the young prince. All of them remained in an adjoining anteroom as the queen went on into the prince’s solar, where he had been lining up toy knights on the floor of a window embrasure. His little tunic of Haldane crimson was a bright splash of color against the whitewashed stone. A sad-eyed governess had been supervising his play, but withdrew immediately at Michaela’s appearance, only pausing to bob her a sympathetic curtsey.
“Good morning, my love,” Michaela called, smiling and holding her arms out to Owain as he scrambled to his feet with a crow of delight and ran to embrace her around the knees.
“Mummy! Come and see my knights! There’s one that looks like Papa. He’s going to fight the bad prince who wants to take away his crown.”
Fighting back her grief, smiling despite it as she bent to kiss him, she let him lead her back to the window embrasure, where she sank down on the step to let him point out his favorites. There was, indeed, a knight on a white horse that looked something like Rhysem, with a tiny gold lion painted on his crimson shield and a little crown on his helm. Cathan had made them for Owain the previous winter, and they were rather larger than the usual sort, standing halfway to the boy’s knees. Another knight on a grey carried a miniature Haldane banner.
“That’s Uncle Cathan,” Owain said, pointing him out, “and there’s the bad prince. He keeps falling down.”
She looked beyond the royal forces at a motley array of smaller figures painted in the tawny and black and white of Torenth, one of which had fallen over. Stiffening her resolve, Michaela held out her arms to Owain again.
“Darling, come and sit on Mummy’s lap, would you? I have something to tell you.”
Owain looked at her curiously and picked up the figures of his father and Cathan before coming to climb down a step and then ease onto her lap, settling a little uneasily as he twisted around to watch her. She hugged him close for a moment, pressing a kiss to the tousle of black, sweet-smelling hair, then reached around him to gently stroke a fingertip across the crown on the figure of the king.
“Darling, something very sad has happened to your papa. He hurt his hand, and it made him very sick. His doctors tried very hard to make him better, but he—”
“Papa’s sick?” Owain whispered, his little face going still and anxious.
Michaela shook her head, blinking back tears. “Not anymore, my darling,” she whispered. “Your papa is with the angels now. His hurt hand made him very, very, ill, so—the angels have taken him to be with God.”
“With—God?” the boy repeated, bewildered.
“Your papa has died, my love. He’s gone to Heaven, to be with God.”
“No!” Owain said flatly. “My papa can’t be dead.”
“Oh, darling, I wish it weren’t true—you know I do
. But it is. It’s very, very sad, but—”
“Who hurted my papa’s hand?” Owain demanded, anger flashing in the grey Haldane eyes as tears began to well. “Did the bad prince hurt my papa?”
“I—don’t know exactly, darling,” she heard herself saying. “We’ll know more when …”
She let her voice trail away as he collapsed weeping in her arms, sobbing his little heart out, the toy knights still clutched in both hands. She wept with him, letting fall the tears she had denied herself the night before but aware, in some deep recess of dispassionate logic, that her grief was tempered still by the discipline Rhysel had imposed, lest the shock do harm to the other life she carried. She felt it as a profound sadness that might well persist until her dying day, but not a life-shattering sorrow that might keep her from her duty.
As Owain gradually subsided to hiccoughs and moist sniffling, huddled down in her lap, Michaela also mastered her tears. Pulling a handkerchief from her sleeve, she wiped her eyes and composed herself, then produced another one to blot away her son’s tears.
“Can you blow for me?” she whispered.
He complied, but he would not let go of the toy knights in his hands. Still sniffling, he squirmed around to turn tear-reddened eyes to hers.
“Mummy, I have a question,” he said tremulously.
“Yes, darling?”
“Did the bad prince take away my papa’s crown?”
She smiled gently and brushed the hair off his forehead as she shook her head. “No, my darling, he did not. Your papa left his crown for you. And no one shall ever, ever take it away from you—I promise.”
Owain looked doubtful. “But I’m only little, Mummy. What if the bad prince comes?”
“The bad prince is dead, my love,” she whispered, wishing the other “bad prince” were dead as well. “He can’t come and take your crown. And you shall grow up to be a very brave and wise and powerful king, the way your papa wanted.”
“I’ll be king like Papa?”
“You will, my darling. And until you’re big like Papa, there will be wise men to help you learn how to be a king.”
Owain sighed. “More lessons.”
“I’m afraid so,” Michaela said with an amused chuckle. “For many, many years. But for now, I think you should have your first lesson today in being a proper king. The archbishop and some of the other great lords are waiting outside to see you. Now that you’re king, there are some things they have to do and some words they have to say. Do you think you could be a very brave boy for me and make Papa proud in Heaven?”
“What I have to do?” he asked suspiciously.
“Just be very polite and answer when you’re spoken to. There will be quite a lot of bowing, and after they’ve said some words, they’ll want to come and kiss your hand, the way you’ve seen them do for me and for Papa. That’s their way of showing you that they know you’re the king now. Would that be all right?”
He nodded thoughtfully. “Can I take my knights?”
“Well—how about just the one of Papa? And you must hold him like this, with your left hand, so they can kiss the other one. We’ll let Uncle Cathan stay here to see that the other ones behave—all right?”
“All right.”
“Now, hold out your hand the way you’ve seen Papa do, so that I can rest my hand on yours while we go into the next room. That’s right.” She rose and laid her left hand on his right: “Now, you are the king, and I am your lady, and we must be very dignified as we go to meet your great lords.”
She could tell that Hubert was pleased, when it was over. Little Owain escorted her into the next room with four-year-old dignity, accepting their bows as his due, and waited for another chair to be brought for his mother before he would sit on the one they had provided for him. After that, while Earl Tammaron read out the proclamation of accession, Owain sat quietly, tightly hugging his toy knight, then gravely allowed each of them to kiss his hand. He came close to tears when Hubert briefly slipped his father’s Ring of Fire on his left hand, bewildered and a bit distressed because it was far too big, but he brightened when Lady Nieve produced a sturdy gold chain from which to suspend it around his neck.
His exemplary behavior earned his mother the privilege of taking him back to her own apartments for the rest of the day. Secorim was dubious at first, being but recently apprised of the nature of the late king’s tense relationship with his great lords, but Tammaron argued as the father of four sons that a child’s place at a time like this was with his mother, king or no king. Even the usually hard-hearted Richard, whose son was a year older than Owain, had to agree that the young king ought not to be kept from his mother, at least until after the two very emotion-laden events still to come—the return of the late king’s body to Rhemuth, with its reception on the cathedral steps, and the state funeral to follow. Hubert concurred.
Thanking God for this small mercy, Michaela let them escort her and Owain back to the royal apartments, herself bringing the Uncle Cathan knight so that Owain could carry the Papa knight and still cling tightly to her hand. As soon as she and Owain had reached the sanctuary of her solar, she divested herself of coronet and veils and bade Rhysel loose her hair, letting it tumble around her shoulders the way Owain liked it as she bent to give him another hug.
As they retreated to the bedchamber beyond, she found that Lady Estellan and the other ladies had set out a light lunch—much appreciated, for Michaela had not had the stomach to eat anything earlier. She still could not bring herself to eat very much, but young Owain tucked in with surprisingly good appetite, making sure that Papa, Uncle Cathan, and their horses all had portions of bread and cheese set before them. After he had eaten his fill, Rhysel helped his mother pull off the crimson tunic and shoes and bed down the little king for an afternoon nap. When the other ladies had gone out, all solicitude and sympathetic tongue-cluckings for the brave little prince, Rhysel bade the queen lie down, too.
“You need the rest as much as he does,” she whispered, as she helped the queen remove her outer robe and lie down in her shift. “And don’t worry about telling me anything; I’ll Read it while you sleep and then see how the king fares as well, underneath his show of bravery.”
The respite into sleep was welcome and left several fewer hours of the afternoon to be endured, when she awoke. Owain’s governess and a page had brought the rest of his beloved knights and a very small black tunic while they napped, and Michaela sat silently watching him until suppertime, as he took the knights out of their wicker basket and improvised an ambush for the bad prince from behind a hillock made of her shoes. Both his concentration and the black tunic were all too sober for so young a child, but she knew they were but the least of things he would have to bear all too young.
A bath was brought after supper, and Michaela gladly bent to the task of bathing him herself—something she had not been allowed to do for some time. Afterward, when he was asleep, tucked clean and sweet-smelling into the bed she lately had shared with his father, she knelt beside him and stroked the raven hair and prayed for his life. There was another child beneath her heart, but this one was the one who would have to bear up under whatever the regents tried in the days and weeks and years to come. Far too soon, he would be asked to follow in his father’s footsteps and take up at least the promise of his Haldane heritage.
And tomorrow, he must watch his father’s body brought back to Rhemuth in a coffin. Hubert had come after supper to tell her that the cortege would arrive sometime after noon. The news set a further blight on what remained of the evening, and she was glad to retire early and let Rhysel take her deep into undreaming sleep.
An update the next morning, after breakfast, indicated that the procession probably would not reach the cathedral much before three. Already dressed in her widow’s weeds but with hair still flowing loose for Owain’s sake, Michaela spent the morning gazing out the window at the gardens below, while Owain played at her feet with his knights, the Ring of Fire and its golden chai
n a bright contrast against his funereal black. After lunch, she let Rhysel do up her hair and donned her widow’s veil and the State Crown, with its crosses and leaves intertwined.
Tammaron and Richard came to fetch them at two—an easy enough escort as far as the great hall, for Owain knew both of them. But as the royal party emerged on the great hall steps, great lords and bereaved queen and wide-eyed boy clutching a toy knight under one arm, a Custodes guard of honor came to attention with such clashing of weapons and stamping of feet that young Owain faltered, burying his face in his mother’s skirts.
“There, now, my darling,” Michaela whispered, bending down to comfort him as Earl Tammaron indicated they should proceed to the canopied sedan-chair waiting at the bottom of the steps. “Those men are doing you honor. Many men will do you honor today. Do you remember how the great lords kissed your hand yesterday?”
He nodded tremulously.
“Well, soldiers show their respect by clashing their weapons like that, because that is how they serve you—with their strength of arms. Now, hold your head up and take Mummy’s hand the way you did yesterday. Why, I do believe we’re meant to ride in one of the archbishop’s rather splendid sedan-chairs. Have you ever wondered what it would be like to travel in one of those? I know I have.”
Thus reassured, he did as she bade, gravely taking her down the steps and handing her into the sedan-chair with the aplomb of a courtier many times his age. He was rather less dignified as Tammaron lifted him up beside her, once she had settled her skirts and made space for him.
“It’s high,” he whispered, as he settled the Papa knight more securely under his arm and held on with his other hand.
“A little,” she conceded. “But think how well you’ll be able to see.”