The Bastard Prince (4 page)

Still a little stunned, nonetheless, he considered his situation as he crossed the fronts of a clean white shirt his body squire had just put on him, stuffing the tails into the waist of close-fitting black breeches and then holding out his arms for the sleeves to be fastened at the wrists.

At least the afternoon was mild, not at all like that other June, when his brother Alroy lay dying and his brother Javan had come back to Court, forever changing the destiny of the fourteen-year-old Prince Rhys Michael Alister Haldane. Seven years had passed since then, and Rhys Michael had been king for six of them—king in name, at least.

For now he knew, though he had not wanted to believe it at the time, that Javan's own great lords had conspired to be rid of him, the king they could not control, and to set Rhys Michael in his place. It had cost the youngest of the Haldane princes his innocence and the lives of his brother and the child who would have been his own firstborn son. It had also cost him his freedom for the future and sentenced whatever further progeny he might engender to a life dictated by the great lords. As King Rhys, he now came and went at their behest, all but worn down by the intervening years of subjugation, both physical and mental, with even the thought of further resistance almost battered into resignation and acceptance of what they required, if he wished to survive.

This latest development might not set too well with their long-range plans, though. Already, a faint pang of hope had flared in his breast, where he had thought all chance of deliverance nearly stifled.

He had a fair idea what the waiting Torenthi herald would say, based on Hubert's briefing and the news brought earlier by the Eastmarch messengers. The seizure of Culliecairn, with its castle and garrison and town, could not be tolerated. Culliecairn guarded the Torenth-side entrance to the Coldoire Pass, the most direct route through the northern Rhelljan Mountains between Eastmarch and the Torenthi Duchy of Tolan. Hubert had already mentioned the likelihood of an immediate campaign to free Culliecairn, even conceding that it probably would be necessary for Rhys Michael to go along. The king had been forbidden to make any official commitment without first clearing it with his advisors—which rankled, as such constraints always did; but the developing scenario also reminded Rhys Michael most pointedly that he was still an anointed king.

At least they had never forbidden him to
look
like a king. Indeed, they demanded it, whenever they trotted him out for some state occasion that required his official presence. The great lords approved of keeping up appearances. The body squire kneeling at his feet had given his boots a final buff with a soft cloth and now was buckling golden spurs to his heels.

“Beg pardon, Sire,” his senior aide murmured, easing past the squire with a plain white belt in his hands.

Faintly bemused, the king lifted both arms away from his sides to allow it. Dark-haired and dark-eyed, Sir Fulk Fitz-Arthur was several years his junior, obliging and loyal enough in most things, but loyal first to his father, Lord Tammaron, if pushed to a choice. Rhys Michael tried to avoid forcing that choice whenever possible, for he honestly liked Fulk and sensed that the liking was mutual; but not for an instant did he believe that mere fondness might make Fulk overlook forbidden deviations from what the great lords permitted.

Far more certain was the loyalty of his other aide, who was shaking out a scarlet over-robe over in the better light of an open window. A year younger than Fulk, and brother to Rhys Michael's beloved Michaela, Sir Cathan Drummond had been a towheaded squire of twelve on that awful day of the coup, witness to much of the slaughter, nearly a victim himself, and as helpless as Rhys Michael to prevent any of it.

Fortunately, the great lords had stopped short of killing the queen's brother the way they had so many others of those loyal to the Haldanes. After several months' confinement following the coup, upon giving his solemn oath never to speak of what he had witnessed that day, Cathan had been permitted to return to the royal household, the token member actually to be chosen by the new king and queen and the only person, other than themselves, on whom they could always and utterly rely.

It had not taken Cathan long to discover what he must do in order to stay alive, even if he
was
the queen's brother. Grudgingly permitted to resume his training in arms, as well as the gentler accomplishments expected of noble young men headed toward knighthood, he had quickly learned not to do
too
well at anything that might suggest a threat to those who were the true masters at Rhemuth Castle. His eventual knighting, the previous Twelfth Night, had been one of the few acts as king that Rhys Michael had performed gladly, of his own volition. Permission to appoint Cathan as a second aide had been an unexpected dividend of the evening, though the king suspected expediency rather than charity to have been Hubert's motive. Now a belted knight as well as brother to the queen, Cathan was least apt to cause trouble if he continued directly in the royal household, where he could be watched. It kept Cathan himself under scrutiny, but at least it allowed Rhys Michael an adult confidant and ally besides his wife.

As if sensing the king's fond gaze upon him, Cathan came smiling now to lay the scarlet over-robe around his sovereign's shoulders. The fronts were stiff with gold embroidery, as were the wide cuffs of the sleeves, and the broad clasp Cathan snapped closed across the chest resembled the morse of a bishop's cope. He had pinned to the robe's left shoulder a large, fist-sized brooch with the golden lion of Gwynedd embossed upon it, the background inlaid in crimson enamel—Michaela's gift to the king on the birth of little Prince Owain. For the three of them, it had come to symbolize their hopes of a House of Haldane no longer fettered by the great lords.

Blessing Cathan for having thought of it, especially today, Rhys Michael let his fingertips brash the brooch in passing as he adjusted the hang of a flowing sleeve, knowing Cathan would catch the significance. Fulk had turned away briefly to fetch a burnished metal mirror, so missed the gesture entirely.

“A good choice, Sire,” Fulk declared, as he angled the mirror to reflect the royal image.

“Yes, I thought so.”

Critically the king studied the overall effect, nervously ruffling one hand through the short-cropped black cap of his hair as he turned to view himself from several angles. He would have preferred to wear his hair longer, perhaps pulled back in a queue or braid, but for some reason the great lords insisted that he keep it short—almost clerical in its severity, though without the shaved tonsure. He had often wondered why—further assertion of their control over every aspect of his life, he suspected. But it sometimes had occurred to him to wonder whether they thought that, as with Samson, they could keep him from gaining strength by cutting his hair.

At least the stark barbering let the Eye of Rom be seen. The great ruby glowering in his right earlobe had belonged to his father and both his brothers before him and was regarded as part of the official regalia of Gwynedd. King Cinhil had been the first Haldane to wear the stone, but the men who eventually became the great lords of Gwynedd remained unaware that it had been given to Cinhil by the Deryni mage later to be known as Saint Camber. Ancient tradition, likewise unknown to the great lords, identified the stone as one of the gifts of the Magi to the Christ Child, later sold to finance the flight to Egypt. Whether or not that was true, Rhys Michael regarded it as one of his few true links with the kingship he feared he might never wield in fact.

“This will do nicely,” he said, turning back to Cathan. “Let's have the crown, then.”

From a handsome wooden casket studded with brass nail heads, Cathan carefully lifted out the gold and silver State Crown of Gwynedd, with its leaves and crosses intertwined. Cabochon rubies the size of a man's thumbnail had been added to the crown since the coronation six years before, with lesser gems also gleaming among the crown's interstices. Against the sable Haldane hair, as Rhys Michael ducked his head to receive it, the effect was truly majestic.

“Yes, indeed,” Fulk murmured approvingly, as he surveyed the king over the top of the mirror, and Cathan also grinned his agreement. “That should make the Torenthi herald sit up and take notice.”

“Let's see, shall we?” the king replied, smiling.

Before that question could be answered, though, he must first submit to a final briefing, back in the little withdrawing room behind the dais of the great hall. Afterward, he was told to delay his entrance while the great lords took their own places and the hall had a chance to settle—which also gave him opportunity to survey his audience before he went out. He reviewed his instructions and prayed for courage as he cautiously twitched aside a fold of the heavy velvet that curtained the opening through the screens to the dais beyond.

The high-beamed hall was not as crowded as it might have been—which was just as well, since he expected this would be a rather less congenial court than most, based on the news from Eastmarch and that assumed to be borne by the Torenthi herald. Accordingly, he was a little surprised to see a fair number of ladies present—mostly the wives and daughters of the great lords or ladies from the queen's household, twittering anxiously among themselves as they settled on benches in the window embrasures that overlooked the castle gardens. A few were even carrying baskets of embroidery.

He supposed this did concern them, if Gwynedd went to war. Michaela had wanted to attend, but Hubert had forbidden it. He and Paulin were standing along the right side of the dais, Paulin apparently briefing the seated Archbishop Oriss, who had been specially summoned from his sickbed for the occasion and who looked as if he might not make it through the court Behind them, Tammaron was instructing a captain of archers, surreptitiously indicating the long gallery that overlooked the right side of the hall. Farther to the left, just off the dais, Rhun and Manfred appeared to be lecturing an angry looking Lord Richard Murdoch. Albertus was not in evidence. Out in the hall itself, scores of knights and lesser courtiers were also drifting toward the dais where the king shortly would emerge.

And far at the back of the hall, carefully watched by guards in Haldane livery, the legation from Torenth was waiting: half a dozen men-at-arms in eastern-style armor, cloaked in the tawny orange of the Torenthi House of Furstan. One of them bore a flagstaff trailing a banner of white silk. Beneath that banner stood a short, dark man who must be the Torenthi herald. As expected, his tabard bore the springing black hart of Furstan on a silver roundel, differenced of a golden coronet around its proud neck.

“I think they're about ready for us, Sire,” Fulk murmured close by his right ear.

With a grunt for answer, Rhys Michael let fall the curtain and held out his hand to Cathan for the sheathed Haldane sword, laying it in the cradle of his left arm with the hilt like a cross at his elbow. At his nod, Fulk grasped an edge of the heavy curtain and drew it aside, following when the king and then Cathan had gone through.

Those first to notice his entrance stirred and then grew silent as he crossed the dais, turning to follow his progress and bowing when he passed, but not giving his arrival the formality of a state entry, lest too much ceremony acknowledge the importance of the men waiting. Rhys Michael acknowledged their bows with an air of preoccupation, settling stiffly into the throne-chair set under the Haldane canopy, and then handing off the Haldane sword to Cathan again. Not for the first time, he found himself wishing it were Javan still alive to sit here in his place, but he made himself dismiss the thought as futile. Javan was dead, and he was alive; and if he hoped to stay alive, he must be very, very careful how he handled this.

And as Constable Udaut came forward to inquire about the visitors seeking audience at the back of the hall, another reason for caution suddenly became clear. Lord Albertus was entering through the screen entrance at the other side of the dais, accompanied by the two haggard-looking Eastmarch messengers and a handful of his staff, mostly black-robed
Custodes
knights. Among the latter, similarly garbed in black, was a small, dark man known only as Dimitri, said to be Deryni, though few at court were aware of that. Though ostensibly employed by Paulin and the
Custodes Fidei
, his exact allegiance was unknown, the last time Rhys Michael heard—and it had been Javan who had told him that, in one of their last conversations before Javan rode off to what was to be his death. In the back of his mind, Rhys Michael had always wondered whether the mysterious Dimitri was at least partially responsible for the treachery.

It was certain that Javan's Deryni allies had not counted Dimitri an ally; and whether he was working
only
for Paulin and his
Custodes
remained an unanswered question. Not for the first time, Rhys Michael lamented the fact that not one of Javan's Deryni allies had managed to make contact with him since Javan's death, though reason reminded him of their small numbers even then; and the few that he knew of personally had died by the same treachery that took Javan.

The one ray of hope that made him keep believing that there had ever been Deryni backing for the House of Haldane was the fact that, as Javan had predicted, Rhys Michael gradually had learned to discern whether a man was telling the truth. This usually was a Deryni talent, he knew, and ordinary humans could not detect or prevent its use against them—a decided advantage in his present circumstances, except that even if Dimitri had not been present, the Torenthi herald and at least some of his escort undoubtedly were Deryni.

This rather canceled out any advantage his meager talent might have given him; for Deryni, though they could not prevent being Truth-Read, sometimes could detect it. It would not do for the Torenthi herald to know what Rhys Michael could do, even if he could keep it from Dimitri.