The Bastard Prince
“Mummy—why you washing my hand? Is it morning already?”
“Not yet, darling. There’s something Papa asked us to do, but you must be very, very quiet. It might be a little scary, but you’ll be very brave, won’t you?”
“For Papa?” Owain murmured, rubbing at his eyes with his free hand, which he then offered her. “Wash other hand, too?”
“All right, we’ll wash both hands,” Michaela murmured, glancing at Rhysel, who was only barely containing a smile. “Can you sit up a little better for me now? That’s right. Let me put my arms around you and hug you. Mmmmm, I do love you!” she declared, kissing the top of his head.
He grinned and wriggled contentedly in her arms. “An’ I love you, Mummy. What we do for Papa?”
“Well, Uncle Cathan brought us something that Papa very much wanted you to have. It’s a very special present.”
“Papa’s Lion,” Owain breathed, as she took it out of the ba sin, not touching the clasp, and shook off the excess water.
“It is, indeed. Soon after you were born, I asked a man to make this for your papa, to remind us of the crown Papa wore—the crown that you’re going to wear.” She set the curved body of the brooch in Owain’s small right hand with the gold clasp opened at right angles, cupping her own hand around his to steady brooch and clasp, glancing at Rhysel.
“Now, here’s the part that’s very special. You can’t see the lion right now, can you?”
“No.”
“Well, something else that you can’t see is a special kind of magic that Papa left you, that will help you be a proper king some day, like him.” She gently sought his left hand with hers and opened the little fingers. “I can’t explain how or why right now—you’ll find out when you’re bigger—but I promise you that Papa wanted us to do this. You might think it’s a little scary, so you must be brave, but I promise I won’t hurt you. Will you be brave for Papa?”
Frowning a little, he twisted his face around slightly to look at her, grey Haldane eyes searching hers.
“Brave for Papa?” he murmured.
Before he could change his mind—or she could change hers—she braced his hand against hers and set the point of the brooch’s clasp lightly against his flesh—flesh of her flesh. Not against the palm, as his father had done the night of his empowering, but just against the tender web of skin stretched between thumb and forefinger—and thrust the sliver of gold home.
With Rhysel controlling, he felt no pain, though he gasped with surprise, but the passage of the gold through her own flesh as well sent a hot chill up her entire arm as the power began to flow.
That he felt, though Rhysel damped his ability to make any sound as energy began to shift within the circle, swirling and then focusing through the Haldane brooch transfixing the hands of mother and son. Most of it flowed into Owain, sending tendrils of potential power probing into the deepest recesses of his being, long after he ceased to be aware of any of it; but some of it cycled through the mother and then back into Owain.
And some of it, and then more of it, flowed into the mother and, finding Haldane flesh, flowed into the child she carried, beginning to quicken the heritage of his blood before ever his tiny body quickened, stirring the Haldane potential in him as well.
She felt it in herself as the power channeled through her and stirred her own Deryni blood to new potency—a tingling and a quickening—and as its wonder registered, she dared to raise her eyes to the glorious light all around her and Owain, to the gossamer forms of winged Others who moved within that light and lifted exquisite, transparent hands to touch their faces in benison.
Tears of gladness welled in her eyes as she held her son close, their hands joined by love as well as gold, and just as she thought her heart could contain no more wonder, she caught just a scarlet glimpse of another among those glorious creatures—surely her own Rhysem, come back to her for just this instant, his form radiant with the perfection of health restored and the beauty of eternity, his face shining beneath a golden crown as he pressed his fingertips lightly, tenderly to his lips, smiling as he offered her his kiss on outstretched hands.
And behind him was another, with quicksilver eyes and quicksilver hair, and a wise, knowing face that smiled, just as the light and the love overwhelmed her.
When Michaela awoke, perhaps an hour later, she wondered a little fuzzily whether she had dreamed it all. The rushlight still was burning on the little table beside the bed, and Owain was snuggled down beside her, his Papa knight loosely clasped under one arm and one thumb but recently slipped from his perfect rosy lips. She smiled and eased the toy from his grasp, leaning it against the headboard beside its companion to take up watch again, then absently smoothed a lock of black hair back from her son’s face—and brushed the little hoop of twisted gold wire in his right earlobe.
“He’ll be fine,” Rhysel’s voice said softly from behind her, at the same time setting a hand on her shoulder to soothe her startled response as she rolled onto her back to stare. “I changed the earring—blooded the Eye of Rom and the Ring of Fire before I put them away in your jewel chest—then I cleaned up the two of you and put everything back the way it was supposed to be. It’s a good thing you didn’t try this on your own.”
Michaela swallowed and bunked at the Deryni woman, amazed that she could be so calm and matter-of-fact after what had happened.
“Did you—see anything?” she asked.
Rhysel nodded slowly. “I felt quite a lot, too. Now I know why no one’s supposed to touch the subject during such a working. No harm done to any of the parties involved”—she held up a hand to stay Michaela’s concern—“I was prepared. But it was—intense.” She cocked her head. “I never met Cinhil or Javan, but I’d have to say that your Rhysem probably was the finest Haldane to date, when it comes to figuring out how the Haldane power is supposed to be used. If his sons are half as good, they’ll be something very special.”
“Did you—see Rhysem?” Michaela asked.
“Aye. And my grandfather, I think.” She sighed. “I wish I’d known him. Uncle Joram says he really is a saint—or at least he seems to do a lot of things that saints do. One thing is certain: he didn’t just die, all those years ago.”
Michaela nodded slowly, fighting back a heavy yawn, men went ahead and indulged it.
“You’d better get some sleep,” Rhysel said softly, laying her hand gently on the queen’s. “I can’t explain it, but I think your own power may have increased from the spillover. I do advise rest, though. The next few days are apt to be rough. Please don’t fight me.”
Fighting sleep was the last thing on Michaela’s mind as she let her eyelids close. And the last thing she thought, as she drifted into sleep, was to wonder what Rhysem had done to her, from beyond the grave—or from the cathedral, it occurred to her, as she yawned again and then sank. Because Rhysem wasn’t even buried yet …
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
I speak of the things which I have made touching the king.
—Psalms 45:1
When Rhysel reported the results of the queen’s work to Joram, a short while later, his elation could scarcely be contained. Almost, she fancied she could hear him laughing aloud in the room with her, as she had not heard him laugh in years.
The new king confirmed in his potential and Michaela somehow boosted to higher ability? This is welcome news. I begin to think we may actually pull this off. I’ve never heard of such a secondary effect, but who really knows anything about the Haldane potential? Ansel and Queron and the others will be delighted.
After giving her an update on their progress and estimated arrival time, he offered further instructions.
Just be certain that nothing prevents the queen from making the usual appearances in the next few days, and the young king with her. We wouldn’t want the regents to decide, for example, that attending the funeral would be too much strain on her and the baby. On the other hand, if she seems too strong, they may decide that they don’t need Catha
n any longer. You’ve not been able to discover a clue as to what’s become of him?
The official word is that he’s “indisposed” Someone tried to tell us that he was simply catching up on his sleep, but I didn’t like the tone when Tammaron and Manfred took him off to the first meeting of the Regency Council. I’ll try to find out more in the course of tomorrow.
Do that, he responded. And in the meantime, if it can be managed at all, try to give Michaela an intensive course in using what she’s acquired. You know the specific skills to concentrate on.
I’ll do the best I can, she agreed. Tomorrow is the lying-in-state, but I don’t expect they’ll allow her to go to that, since they let her be there to receive the body this afternoon. Even if they did, they wouldn’t let Owain go—and she wouldn’t leave him. Nor would I wish her to. But the great lords will go—or else remain closeted in the council chamber, trying to decide what to do about Kheldour. In either case, I’ll try to find out more about Cathan. It would be bitter irony if he got this far, only to perish before we can bring our plan to fruition.
Cathan had not yet perished, though he could almost wish he had. He had guessed they might bleed him again, so was not surprised when Lior and his Custodes guards took him to a bleak cell in the bowels of the castle where Brother Polidorus soon appeared, armed with basin, ligature, and lancet. The guards had held him while Polidorus performed the operation, and Cathan had fought it despite the futility, sickeningly aware how his strength ebbed as the volume of his blood in the china basin grew.
Lior had stopped it short of seriously endangering him, of course, for they still needed him for a few more days at least. It was done purely to intimidate him further; their drugs would have been sufficient to keep him docile. But the medication Polidorus gave him afterward, though enough to blur his vision and render him incapable of standing unassisted, was not enough to force him into the mercy of sleep, where he could forget his plight for a few hours; and merely dozing brought nightmares. At midnight, left alone in only shirt and breeches, his bandaged arm still smarting, he lay awake by choice in his close prison cell, staring at the barrel-vaulted ceiling and praying for deliverance, one bare ankle shackled to an iron ring in the wall at the foot of the wooden bedstead.
And at midnight, the torches and candles were still burning in the council chamber, as the newly reunited Regency Council continued to consider strategies to protect what they had stolen.
“It doesn’t seem likely, then, that any serious force from Eastmarch can reach here in less than two or three days,” Tammaron was saying, as he rubbed wearily at his eyes. “We’re probably safe until after the funeral. By then, we’ll have our troops in place and the city secure. Also, the more men they try to bring, the slower they’ll be. What’s the earliest that a messenger could have reached them with the news?”
“Well, it would have been a solid two days’ ride to Lochalyn Castle,” Manfred said. “Obviously, we made no attempt to send word north, but it’s possible, I suppose, that they might have had agents among our returning forces, who could have carried the news. But our own men didn’t know of the king’s death until the next morning, other than the officers billeted at the convent. The sisters at the convent knew, of course, but we closed it down for the night, and no one left.”
“Except that priest who heard the king’s final confession,” Rhun murmured. “You wouldn’t have thought such an old man could disappear that quickly, without someone seeing him.”
“What priest was that?” Hubert inquired, looking sharply at Lior.
“Just—an itinerant father who showed up at the convent, your Grace,” Lior answered uncomfortably. “Some priest of Saint Jarlath—a Father Donatus. I’d given the king the last anointing during the night, but he’d refused confession and Holy Communion. By then, he was—not kindly disposed toward Custodes clergy.” He blanched as he caught Hubert’s simmering look of resentment, only then remembering how the king’s brother, King Alroy, had similarly refused Hubert’s ministrations when he lay dying.
“I’d been trying to locate someone not of my Order,” Lior offered. “I couldn’t let him die without full benefit of the Sacraments.”
“A salve to your conscience, after you’d set about his death,” Rhun muttered, subsiding at Manfred’s sharp glance.
“The convent’s own priest was away, but one of the sisters produced this Father Donatus just after noon,” Lior went on cautiously. “He looked harmless enough—he was quite old—and he wasn’t in Custodes habit. I took him to the king immediately. Apparently his Highness found him acceptable. The priest was with him when he died, and he comforted Sir Cathan afterward.”
“And disappeared before he could be interrogated,” Hubert said coldly, “being well aware of the circumstances of the king’s death, having heard his last confession.”
Secorim frowned, daring to come to Lior’s defense. “With all due respect, your Grace, the priest is bound by the seal of—”
“You apparently assume far more conscience in the Order of Saint Jarlath than exists in your own Order, Secorim,” Hubert said coldly. “How many times have you and I—and Paulin, in his time—broken the seal when it suited our convenience? Donatus, Donatus—the name means ‘a gift,’ doesn’t it? Lior, what did he look like?”
“Just an aging country priest, your Grace. Not a large man,” he elaborated, at Hubert’s sharp look. “Sparse of flesh—wiry, I would say—dark eyes, white hair, neatly tonsured.”
“And wearing the robes of the Order of Saint Jarlath.” Hubert shook his head, still looking annoyed. “Secorim, send to the Abbot of Saint Jarlath’s and find out whether he has a priest meeting that description. I know it will take some time, but I want to know. In the meantime—” He leaned back in his chair, smiling dangerously. “I wonder what else Sir Cathan can tell us about the man.”
A quarter hour later, Cathan was again seated in the chair at the end of the council table, barefooted and restrained by manacles and fetters, his prisoner status now undeniable. Again he wished they had given him the mercy of heavier medication, so he could have escaped this interrogation. Instead, he fought to keep his head up and follow the line of Hubert’s questioning.
“I’ve told you, I never saw the man before that day,” he said, which was true enough. “Surely you don’t expect me to recognize every priest in every little religious order in Gwynedd. Besides, I was hardly in any condition to notice details. He was a priest that the king was willing to see. That was the only thing on my mind.”
“And what did he say to you, after he took you out of the death chamber? Where did you go? Where did he go?”
“I don’t remember exactly what he said. Words intended to comfort, I’m sure. I’m afraid I wasn’t in any condition to appreciate them.”
“And you went—where?” Hubert repeated.
“To—to the chapel.” Cathan shook his head bleakly. “We prayed, I think. Yes, I’m sure we must have done. And then he—left. And Fulk and I went back to the king.”
“Did you see him leave? Did he take a horse?”
“I don’t remember seeing either,” Cathan whispered, which was true. “I wanted to get back to Rhysem’s body. I wanted to—attend him, to serve him one last time. But they were—cutting off his hand …”
The memory was suddenly before him again, far too vividly, loosed and intensified by the drugs in his body. He felt the bleak horror rising in his throat as he buried his face in manacled hands and started sobbing, a still coherent and logical part of him daring to hope that his interrogators would find it difficult to cope with emotions loosed by the medication they themselves had given him.
Even drug-fuzzed, his logic turned out to be correct. When they concluded that he could tell them nothing more, they let the guards take him back to his cell.
This time, he did sleep from sheer exhaustion; but in his dreams, stirred by emotion and unfettered by his medication, he relived those terrible last hours over and over again.
/> He saw no one but his Custodes jailers the next day. He dozed uneasily through most of it. The meal they brought him at midday was drugged, but he ate it anyway, for starving himself would only make him weaker, and they would only drug him some other way if he refused to eat; the sting of a Deryni pricker would utterly betray him. His only consolation was that they would have to bring him out for the funeral the next day, for they dared not risk his sister’s hysteria, if he was not at her side to help her through the emotions of the day.
Michaela, too, dozed through much of the day, though her sleep was that of deep trance, interspersed by the usual constraints imposed on a captive queen. Archbishop Hubert invited her to attend Mass that morning in the chapel royal, but she did not wish to subject Owain to the strain of another public appearance and would not leave him while she went. In any case, she could not bear the thought of receiving the Sacrament from Hubert when it was not required. Tomorrow would be more than sufficient for that.
At least Owain seemed fine when he woke, chirpy and eager for breakfast, apparently unaffected by what had happened the night before, if he even remembered any of it. Rhysel assured the queen that he would not.
“He Reads very much like a Deryni child,” Rhysel told her, as she braided her hair after their leisurely breakfast, still cloistered in the queen’s bedchamber. Owain had retreated to the window embrasure with the Papa knight and the Uncle Cathan knight and was setting up the others his governess had brought the day before, taking them out of their wicker basket and lining them up for royal inspection.
“If he grows into his powers in a similar way,” Rhysel continued, “he won’t have much access until he approaches puberty—but that’s as it should be, because you wouldn’t want a child wielding the kind of power he’ll have until some discretion is acquired. After all, he still has to survive among humans who are basically afraid of us.”