“Orico was taken up safely, then?” Cazaril asked.
“Yes, by the Bastard. As gods-rejected in death as he was in life. It stirred a bit of unpleasant speculation about his parentage, alas.”
“Not so, lady. He was surely Ias’s child. I think the Bastard has been special guardian of his House since Fonsa’s reign. And so this time the god picked first, not last.”
She shrugged her thin shoulders. “A sorry guardianship, if so. On the day before he died, Orico said to me that he wished he’d been born the son of a woodcutter, and not the son of the roya of Chalion. Of all the epitaphs on his death, his own seems the most apposite to me.” Her voice grew a shade more sour. “Martou dy Jironal, they say, was taken up by the Father.”
“So I had heard. They sent his body to his daughter in Thistan to take charge of. Well, he, too, had his part to play, and little enough joy it brought him in the end.” He offered after a moment, “I can personally guarantee you, though, his brother Dondo was carried to the Bastard’s hell.”
A small, grim smile curved her lips. “Perchance he may learn better manners there.”
There seemed nothing to add to this, as epitaphs went.
Cazaril was reminded of a curiosity, and diffidently cleared his throat. “The day before Orico died. And which day would that have been, my lady?”
Her eyes flew to his, and her dark brows went up. After a moment she said, “Why, the day after Iselle’s wedding, of course.”
“Not the day before? Martou dy Jironal seemed strangely misinformed, then. Not to mention premature in certain of his actions. And…it seems to me very like a certain cursed luck, to die just a day before one’s rescue.”
“I, and Orico’s physician, and Archdivine Mendenal, who all attended on him together, will all swear that Orico yet lived to speak to us that afternoon and evening, and did not breathe his sad last until early the next morning.” She met his gaze very directly indeed, her lips still set in that same grim curve. “And so Iselle’s marriage to Royse Bergon is unassailably valid.”
And thus a legal quibble was rendered unavailable to disaffected lords as a pretext for defiance. Cazaril imagined it, her daylong secret deathwatch beside the gelid bloated corpse of her husband. What had she thought about, what had she reflected upon, as the hours crept by in that sealed chamber? And yet she had made of that horror a pragmatic gift for Iselle and Bergon, for the House of Chalion that she was departing. He pictured her suddenly as a tidy housewife, sweeping out her old familiar rooms for the last time, and leaving a vase of flowers on the hearth for the new owners.
“I…think I see.”
“I think you do. You always had very seeing eyes, Castillar.” She added after a moment, “And a discreet tongue.”
“A condition of my service, Royina.”
“You have served the House of Chalion well. Better, perhaps, than it deserved.”
“But not half so well as it needed.”
She sighed agreement.
He made polite inquiry after her plans; she was indeed returning to her home province, to take residence at a country estate happily to be entirely under her own direction. She seemed not just resigned but eager to escape Cardegoss and leave it to her successors. Cazaril, rising, wished her well, and a safe journey, with all his heart. He kissed her hands; she in turn kissed his and, briefly, touched her fingertips to his forehead as he bent to her.
He watched her train of carts rumble away, wincing in sympathy as they jounced over the ruts. The roads of Chalion could use improvement, Cazaril decided, and he had ridden over enough of them to know. He’d seen roads in the Archipelago made wide and smooth for all weathers—perhaps Iselle and Bergon needed to import some Roknari masons. Better roads, with fewer bandits on them, would do a world of good for Chalion. Chalion-Ibra, he corrected this thought, and smiled as Foix gave him a leg up onto his horse.
29
Palli had sent Ferda galloping ahead while Cazaril lingered by the roadside to speak with Royina Sara. As a result, the Zangre’s castle warder and an array of servants were waiting to greet the party from Taryoon when they rode at last into the castle courtyard. The castle warder bowed to Cazaril as the grooms helped him down from his horse. Cazaril stretched, carefully, and asked in an eager voice, “Are Royina Iselle and Royse Bergon within?”
“No, my lord. They are just this hour gone to the temple, for the ceremonies of investiture for Lord dy Yarrin and Royse Bergon.”
The new royina had, as anticipated, selected dy Yarrin for the new holy general of the Daughter’s Order. The appointment of Bergon to the Son’s generalship was, in Cazaril’s view, a brilliant stroke to recover direct control of that important military arm for the royacy, and remove it as a bone of contention among the high lords of Chalion. It had been Iselle’s own idea, too, when they had discussed the matter before she and Bergon had left Taryoon. Cazaril had pointed out that while she could not in honor fail to reward dy Yarrin’s loyalty with the appointment he’d so ardently desired, dy Yarrin was not a young man; in time, the generalship of the Daughter, too, must revert to the royacy.
“Ah!” cried Palli. “Today, is it? Is the ceremony still going forward, then?”
“I believe so, March.”
“If I hurry, perhaps I can see some of it. Cazaril, may I leave you to the good care of this gentleman? My lord warder, see that he takes his rest. He is not nearly so recovered from his late wounds as he will try to make you believe.”
Palli reined his horse around and gave Cazaril a cheery salute. “I shall return with all the tale for you when it’s done.” Followed by his little company, he trotted back out the gate.
Grooms and servants whisked away horses and baggage. Cazaril refused, in what he hoped was a dignified manner, the support of the castle warder’s proffered arm, at least until they should have reached the stairs. The castle warder called him back as he started toward the main block.
“Your room has been moved by order of the royina to Ias’s Tower,” the castle warder explained, “that you may be near her and the royse.”
“Oh.” That had a pleasing sound to it. Agreeably, Cazaril followed the man up to the third floor, where Royse Bergon and his Ibran courtiers had taken their new residence, although Bergon had evidently chosen another official bedchamber for himself than the one Orico had lately died in. Not, Cazaril was given to understand, that the royse slept there. Iselle had just moved into the old royina’s suite, above. The castle warder showed Cazaril to the room near Bergon’s that was to be his. Someone had moved his trunk and few possessions over from his old chamber, and entirely new clothing for tonight’s banquet was already laid out waiting. Cazaril let the servants bring him wash water, but then shooed them away and lay down obediently to rest.
This lasted about ten minutes. He rose again and prowled up one flight to examine his new office arrangements. A maidservant, recognizing him, curtsied him past. He poked his nose into the chamber Sara had kept for her secretary. As he expected, it was now filled with his records, books, and ledgers from the royesse’s former household, with a great many more added. Unexpectedly, a neat dark-haired fellow, who looked to be about thirty years old, manned his broad desk. He wore the gray robe and carmine shoulder braid of a divine of the Father, and was scratching figures into one of Cazaril’s own account books. Opened correspondence lay fanned out at his left hand, and a larger stack of finished letters rose at his right.
He glanced up at Cazaril in polite but cool inquiry. “May I help you, sir?”
“I—excuse me, I do not believe we have met. Who are you?”
“I am Learned Bonneret, Royina Iselle’s private secretary.”
Cazaril’s mouth opened, and shut. But I’m Royina Iselle’s private secretary! “A temporary appointment, is it?”
Bonneret’s eyebrows went up. “Well, I trust it shall be permanent.”
“How came you by the post?”
“Archdivine Mendenal was kind enough to recommend me to
the royina.”
“Lately?”
“Excuse me?”
“You are lately appointed?”
“These two weeks past, sir.” Bonneret frowned in faint annoyance. “Ah—you have the advantage of me, I believe?”
Quite the reverse. “The royina…didn’t tell me,” said Cazaril. Was he discarded, shunted from his position of trust? Granted, the avalanche of tasks attendant upon Iselle’s ascension to the royacy was hardly going to halt while Cazaril slowly recovered; someone had to attend to them. And, Cazaril noted by the outgoing inscriptions, Bonneret had beautiful handwriting. The divine was frowning more deeply at him. He supplied, “My name is Cazaril.”
Bonneret’s frown evaporated, to be replaced with an even more alarming awed smile; he dropped his quill, spattering ink, and scrambled abruptly to his feet. “My lord dy Cazaril! I am honored!” He bowed low. “What may I do to help you, my lord?” he repeated, in a very different tone.
This eager courtesy daunted Cazaril far more than Bonneret’s former superciliousness. He mumbled some incoherent excuse for his intrusion, pleaded weariness from the road, and fled back downstairs.
He filled a little time inventorying his clothing and too-few books and arranging them in his new chamber. Amazingly, nothing seemed to be missing from his possessions. He wandered to his narrow window, which looked down over the town. He swung his casement wide and craned his neck out, but no sacred crows flew in to visit him. With the curse broken, the menagerie gone, did they still roost in Fonsa’s Tower? He studied the temple domes, and made plans to seek out Umegat at his first opportunity. Then he sat in bewilderment.
He was shaken, and knew it partly for an effect of fatigue. His energy was still fragile, spasmodic. His healing gut wound ached from the morning’s riding, although not as much as when Dondo had used to claw him from the inside. He was gloriously unoccupied, a fact that alone had been enough to keep him ecstatically happy for days. It didn’t seem to be working this afternoon, though. All his urgent push to arrive here made this quiet rest that everybody thought he ought to be having feel rather a letdown.
His mood darkened. Maybe there was no use for him in this new Chalion-Ibra. Iselle would need more learned, smoother men now to help manage her vastly enlarged affairs than a battered and, well, strange ex-soldier with a weakness for poetry. Worse—to be culled from Iselle’s service was to be exiled from Betriz’s daily presence. No one would light his reading candles at dusk, or make him wear warm unfashionable hats, or notice if he fell ill and bring him frightening physicians, or pray for his safety when he was far from home….
He heard the clatter and noise of what he presumed was Iselle and Bergon’s party returning from the ceremonies at the temple, but even at an angle his window did not give a view onto the courtyard. He ought to rush out to greet them. No. I’m resting. That sounded mulish and petulant even to his own inward ear. Don’t be a fool. But a dreary fatigue anchored him in his chair.
Before he could overcome his wash of melancholy, Bergon himself bustled into his chamber, and then it became impossible to stay down-at-the-mouth. The royse was still wearing the brown, orange, and yellow robes of the holy general of the Son’s Order, with its broad sword belt ornamented with the symbols of autumn, all looking a lot better on him than they ever had on old gray dy Jironal. If Bergon was not a joy to the god, there was no pleasing Him at all. Cazaril rose, and Bergon embraced him, inquired after his trip from Taryoon and his healing, barely waited for the answer, tried to tell him in turn of eight things at once, then burst out laughing at himself.
“There will be time for all this shortly. Right now I am on a mission from my wife the royina of Chalion. But tell me first and privately, Lord Caz—do you love the Lady Betriz?”
Cazaril blinked. “I…she…very fond, Royse.”
“Good. I mean, I was sure of it, but Iselle insisted I ask first. Now, and very important—are you willing to be shaved?”
“I—what?” Cazaril’s hand went to his beard. It was not at all as scraggly as it had started out, it had filled in nicely, he thought, and besides, he kept it neatly trimmed. “Is there some reason you ask me this? Not that it matters greatly, beards grow back, I suppose…”
“But you’re not madly attached to it or anything, right?”
“Not madly, no. My hand was shaky for a time after the galleys, and I did not care to carve myself bloody, but I could not afford a barber. Then I just became used to it.”
“Good.” Bergon returned to the doorway, and thrust his head through to the corridor. “All right, come in.”
A barber and a servant holding a can of hot water trooped in at the royse’s command. The barber made Cazaril sit, and whipped his cloth around him. Cazaril found himself soaped up before he could make remark. The servant held the basin beneath his chin as the barber, humming under his breath, went to work with his steel. Cazaril stared down cross-eyed over his nose as blobs of soapy gray and black hair splatted into the tin basin. The barber made unsettling little chirping noises, but at last smiled in satisfaction and grandly gestured the basin away. “There, my lord!” Some work with a hot towel and a cold lavender-scented tincture that stung completed his artistic effort. The royse dropped a coin into the barber’s hand that made him bow low and, murmuring compliments, retreat backwards through the door again.
Feminine giggles sounded from the hallway. A voice, not quite low enough, whispered, “See, Iselle! He does too have a chin. Told you.”
“Yes, you were right. Quite a nice one.”
Iselle stalked in with her back straight, trying to be very royal in her elaborate gown from the investiture, but couldn’t keep her gravity; she looked at Cazaril and burst into laughter. At her shoulder Betriz, almost as finely dressed, was all dimples and bright brown eyes and a complex hairstyle that seemed to involve a lot of black ringlets framing her face, bouncing in a fascinating manner as she moved. Iselle’s hand went to her lips. “Five gods, Cazaril! Once you’re fetched out from behind that gray hedge, you’re not so old after all!”
“Not old at all,” corrected Betriz sturdily.
He had risen at the royesse’s entry, and swept them a courtly bow. His hand, unwilled, went to touch his unaccustomedly naked and cool chin. No one had offered him a mirror by which to examine the cause of all this female hilarity.
“All ready,” reported Bergon mysteriously.
Iselle, smiling, took Betriz’s hand. Bergon grasped Cazaril’s. Iselle struck a pose and announced, in a voice suited to a throne room, “My best-beloved and most loyal lady Betriz dy Ferrej has begged a boon of me, which I grant with all the gladness of my heart. And as you have no father now, Lord Cazaril, Bergon and I shall take his place as your liege lords. She has asked for your hand. As it pleases Us greatly that Our two most beloved servants should also love each other, be you betrothed with Our goodwill.”
Bergon turned up his hand with Cazaril’s in it; Betriz’s descended upon it, capped by Iselle’s. The royse and royina pressed their hands together, and stood back, both grinning.
“But, but, but,” stammered Cazaril. “But this is very wrong, Iselle—Bergon—to sacrifice this maiden to reward my gray hairs is a repugnant thing!” He did not let go of Betriz’s hand.
“We just got rid of your gray hairs,” pointed out Iselle. She looked him over judiciously. “It’s a vast improvement, I have to agree.”
Bergon observed, “And I must say, she doesn’t look very repulsed.”
Betriz’s dimples were as deep as ever Cazaril had seen them, and her merry eyes gleamed up at him through her demurely sweeping lashes.
“But…but…”
“And anyway,” Iselle continued briskly, “I’m not sacrificing her to you as a reward for your loyalty. I’m bestowing you on her as a reward for her loyalty. So there.”
“Oh. Oh, well, that’s better, then…” Cazaril squinted, trying to reorient his spinning mind. “But…surely there are greater lords…richer…younger, hand
somer…more worthy…”
“Yes, well, she didn’t ask for them. She asked for you. No accounting for taste, eh?” said Bergon, eyes alight.
“And I must quibble with at least part of your estimate, Cazaril,” Betriz said breathlessly. “There are no more worthy lords than you in Chalion.” Her grip, in his, tightened.
“Wait,” said Cazaril, feeling he was sliding down a slope of snow, tractionless. Soft, warm snow. “I have no lands, no money. How can I support a wife?”
“I plan to make the chancellorship a salaried position,” said Iselle.
“As the Fox has done in Ibra? Very wise, Royina, to have your principal servants’ principal loyalties be to the royacy, and not divided between crown and clan as dy Jironal’s was. Who shall you appoint to replace him? I have a few ideas—”
“Cazaril!” Her fond exasperation made familiar cadence with his name. “Of course it’s you, who did you think I should appoint? Surely that went without saying! The duty must be yours.”
Cazaril sat down heavily in his late barber chair, still not releasing his clutch on Betriz’s hand. “Right now?” he said faintly.
Her chin came up. “No, no, of course not! Tonight we feast. Tomorrow will do.”
“If you’re feeling up to it by then,” Bergon put in hastily.
“It’s a vast task.” Wish for bread, and be handed a banquet…between those who sought to overprotect him and those who sacrificed his comfort mercilessly to their aims without a second thought, Cazaril decided he rather preferred the latter. Chancellor dy Cazaril. My lord Chancellor. His lips moved, as he shaped the syllables, and crooked up.
“We shall do these announcements all over again publicly tonight after dinner,” said Iselle, “so dress yourself suitably, Cazaril. Bergon and I shall present the chain of office to you then, before the court. Betriz, attend upon me”—her lips curved—“in a little while.” She tucked her hand through Bergon’s arm and drew the royse out after her. The door swung shut.
Cazaril snaked his arm around Betriz’s waist and pulled her, ruthlessly and not at all shyly, down upon his lap. She squeaked in surprise.