Emperor and Clown (53 page)

Inos
did not argue, but it seemed that the casement had effectively arranged events
to bring her back here with a sorcerer in attendance so she could claim her,
throne, and in that case . . .

“Watch
your step here.” A flicker of light burst forth and strengthened. Rap was
holding a lantern. The room was a shambles of bedding and discarded clothes.
She saw empty bottles, too, and the remains of meals.

“I
didn’t have time to tidy up,” he explained as she began picking her way through
the mess. “The imps must have boarded men up here.”

The
thick door had been repaired, most likely by Rap. It opened silently and he led
the way down the curving stair. Her heart was thumping painfully, and there was
a horrid dryness in her throat.

He
paused partway down. “All clear,” he said after a moment. “The whole tower’s
deserted. And it’s all a mess!”

“Rapt
I just thought of something! I came up this tower months ago and disappeared.
Now I reappear and come down again ... What do I say if they ask where I’ve
been?”

“Ignore
them!” Rap said sarcastically. “Tell them you’re starving and ask what’s for
breakfast.”

“Rap!”

He
continued to walk down the steps, with her following. “They’re not going to
ask,” he said. “You’re a queen, and monarchs don’t get questioned. just glare
at them, like the imperor does.”

Easy
for him to say-he was a sorcerer. She would have to practice glaring.

They
emerged into her father’s bedchamber. The mattress lay on the floor, amid some
dirty straw pallets. A few fragments of furniture remained, but most of the
rest must have gone for firewood. The two portraits above the mantel had been
defaced. with charcoal and used for knife-throwing targets. Rags and bottles
and dishes lay everywhere. A fierce anger began to warm her.

The
next room was as bad. The withdrawing room was worse, although admittedly it
had been bad when she saw it last, with charred rugs and broken china littering
the floor. There was an ominous stain near the fireplace.

Down
and down ...

The
Presence Chamber showed signs of recent occupancy-lingering warmth, embers
still smoldering in the grate, rumpled bedding. Four or five men were living
here, she deduced. Her home had been defiled, and her jotunnish blood boiled in
her veins.

On
the last stair Rap halted, and she heard faint sounds of music and shouting.
The beat of her heart was almost as loud. The lantern faded and disappeared.
Then Rap’s strong .hand gripped her wrist. “Invisibility spell,” he whispered.

They
picked their way down, step by step. Faint light showed ahead, seeping around
the curve of the stone, and then she began to stumble-not only was there no Rap
ahead of her to explain that tight grip, but she could not see her own feet. He
steadied her, and they came cautiously into the Throne Room, and into noise.

Here
also lay bedding, and peat glowed hot in the grate. The throne itself had been
removed, but when she raised her eyes to look through the arch into the Great
Hall, she saw it out there, in the middle. A young man was sitting on it, with
a girl on his lap.

Tables
defined a central arena like a dance floor. Other men sprawled at those tables,
with other girls, and they were laughing and jeering as they watched two more
girls dancing clumsily in the center. Off to one side somewhere, a small
orchestra battered away discordantly at a jig tune. Flames leaped in the big
fireplaces.

Girls.
Not women. They all looked younger than herself, and most of them had no
clothes on. She tasted bile in her throat. More than the increasing warmth was
making her sweat inside her wrappings. Azak! Pixies ...

The
men were all jotnar, roughly dressed, most of them. A few had begun to strip.
They were big. She had forgotten how big jotnar could be. These fair-skinned
youths were intimidatingly huge ... just youths, most of them. A few were
older, but she could see none without some trace of beard. The one on the
throne must be Greastax. He wasn’t much more than a boy, and he certainly did
look like a young Kalkor. He was going to die if she had to kill him herself.

But
Nordland raiders never parted from their weapons, even when celebrating
Winterfest. Here and there she recognized palace servants, scurrying to and fro
with bottles and plates. She knew some of the girls, too. Friends, a few of
them, and younger sisters of friends. Children!

Perhaps
there were no older women available now for such sport?

“Gods!”
she muttered under her breath. “Gods, Gods, Gods!”

“Forty-one!”
Rap whispered with satisfaction. “All accounted for. Got any scruples left now?”

“None!”
she said. “They die! All of them!”

“Good.
Let’s go a little faster, all right?”

“Oh,
yes!” She saw another dress being ripped off, and she could about guess what
sort of entertainment was to follow. She almost commanded her court sorcerer to
strike down these brutes as he had blasted Kalkor.

But
that would be too simple. If she hoped to hold her realm by mundane means, then
she must win it by mundane means ... or seem to, at least.

Rap’s
invisible hand tightened on her wrist. “Steady now!”

Shock!
She was plunged back into darkness and arctic cold, and snow underfoot. The
impact disoriented her and she cried out, shivering already.

“Sorry.
I can’t zap us out of the castle. Here, through here.”

He
put her hand on a vertical edge. Her dazzled eyes had begun to pick up the
moonlight again, and an opening. She recognized the postern gate, and clambered
through with a visible Rap close behind her, out into the yard before the
castle, silvered by the high moon.

The
sky was an iron bowl, with only a few stars showing through the moonlight. The
deadly cold prickled in her nostrils and made her eyes water. Her breath was a
rainbow-tinted fog, but there was no wind, and the smoke from the houses rose
in soft pillars the color of the moon.

“Why
can’t you-”

“Shielded.”
He took her wrist again. “Indoors again.”

Shock!
She stumbled, and he put an arm around her, just for a moment. Her ears popped.
A torch spluttered in a sconce ahead of her, and she looked around, seeing
rough wooden walls and stone floor and a few closed doors. They were in one of
the in numerable covered alleyways that were Krasnegar’s winter arteries. The
temperature was much higher around freezing, likely.

“Ready
for your big reappearance scene?” Rap’s tone was jovial, but he was eyeing her
carefully. She nodded. “Let me get my breath back. It’s all a bit much.”

“Fine,”
he said. “No one will disturb us. Open your hood.”

She
fumbled with lacing, hearing now a muffled rumble of conversation nearby. A
sign on the nearest door proclaimed it to be the Beached Whale, and she could
smell fish amid the odor of people and tallow. Now she knew where she was, down
near the docks. How small it all was! How cramped, and shabby!

“We’ll
pick up some jotnar here, and then go on and collect some imps,” Rap said.

“Suppose
they don’t want to come?”

“That’s
up to you. Here, let me.”

Brusquely
he pushed back her hood as she began unfastening the coat. She was very
conscious of his closeness, but he was being businesslike and did not seem to
notice. Something ghostly stirred her hair.

“Now
look!” Rap held up a mirror. There was her face--pale, but stern, not terrified
and bewildered as she felt it should be. Her honey-blond hair sat in waves that
might have come straight from the hands of one of Hub’s expert coiffeuses, and
an emerald tiara sparkled on it. The gown showing through her open coat was
much more ornate than it been when she put it on, glittering with scrolls of
seed pearls and sequins. Obviously Rap had his own ideas of how a Queen of
Krasnegar should look, but he might be able to judge the local thinking better
than she could. Yes, not bad!

And
something else ... Not majesty, surely? Regality? She could not place it, but
she could believe that she was looking at a queen. Was she doing that, or was
he?

“Rap!
This tiara belongs to Eigaze! I borrowed it for the imperor’s ball-”

“No,
you’ve got one just like hers now.” The mirror disappeared as inexplicably as
it had come. “Coronation present from me. I’ve got the weapons when you ask for
them. Now go in there, Queen Inosolan, and claim your inheritance!”

She
nodded dumbly. Then their eyes met. “Give me one little kiss? Just one?”

His
efficient, businesslike expression faded to one of agony. “Oh, Inos!” he
whispered. “Not even your fingers.”

She
closed her eyes. “You’re going to explain this to me, you know,” she said. “What
you’re afraid of. I won’t stand for it!” When she looked again, he had turned
to open the door. She took a deep breath and raised her chin.

As
the door swung open, she was assaulted by heat, and tumult, and a reek of cheap
beer. The big room was dim, yet fogged by smoke from the oil lamps. Below the
rough-plank ceiling, dozens of men were standing in groups or slouched at
tables, yammering away in rowdy voices.

She
strode past Rap and headed for the brightest spot she could see. A man jumped
up from his seat as she approached and wandered off without noticing her. Rap’s
arm was there when she reached for it; she raised her skirts with her other
hand and stepped nimbly. up onto the stool.

The
racket spiraled down into sudden stunned silence. All eyes were on her. Pale
faces staring, golden heads and silver. This was a jotunn watering hole, but
there were imps present there, also, and perhaps that was a good sign. She must
unite the factions, but surely adversity would have already drawn them closer
than before?

Men
at the back scrambled to their feet to see better.

“The
princess!” a voice said in awe, and others picked it up: “The princess! The
princess! . . .”

“The
queen!” shouted another in the far corner, and again there were some echoes. A
few fists banged on tables. Then silence. She thought the light was brightening
around her and dimming elsewhere. Her mouth was parched. No, it wasn’t!

“I
am Queen Inosolan. I have returned to claim my realm!” She dared not pause
there in case someone started to scoff. “I bring weapons and I call for you to
take up arms in my name and wreak vengeance on the jotn ... on the invaders!”

Rap
threw a massive bundle onto the table with a mighty metallic crash. A sudden
tug at her waist told inos that she now wore a sword. She reached under her
coat and drew it.

She
flourished it overhead and the blade struck the ceiling so hard that the hilt
almost slipped from her fingers.

“Who
is with me?”

The
longest two seconds of her life ...

“By
the Powers, I am!” a high-pitched voice cried. A young jotunn sprang to his
feet a couple of tables away. He was very lanky, his blond hair almost brushing
the ceiling, his face bright pink from too much beer.

Kratharkran,
the smith, prompted a voice inside her ear, but she knew Krath. How he had
grown! “Mastersmith Kratharkran, you are welcome! I appoint you leader here.
Issue these weapons, and bring your squad to the bailey. I shall meet you there
with others. The raiders are all gathered in the Great Hall, and we are going
to kill them!”

“Aye!”
Kratharkran roared in a squeak absurdly ill suited to his size. Others jumped
up, also, and then stools were falling all over the room, boots clumping.

“Gods
save the queen!” Kratharkran piped, and a chorus echoed him, “Gods save the
queen!”

Rap
had gripped her wrist again. She jumped down, and her sword miraculously-and
fortunately-vanished as she did so. Invisible hands steadied her when her coat
caught on the stool. Rap pulled, and she headed for the door as a great drunken
clamor of shouting and falling furniture filled the room behind her.

She
was out in the passageway and running, being towed by Rap.

“Beautifully
done! Oh, beautiful!” he shouted back at her.

“You
did it, not me!” She laughed aloud, and he turned his head to smile at her.

Then
he flung open the door of the Southern Dream and dragged her inside before she
could draw breath. The ceiling was even lower, the light even dimmer, and most
of the clustered heads around the tables were dark. Well, imps should be even
more willing to kill jotnar, although it might take more of them.

Again
she was up on a stool; again the light seemed to draw in around her. She had
her speech readytoo ready, for she began almost before there was silence. “I am
Queen Inosolan. I have returned to claim my realm . . .”

The
same crash of weapons from Rap, the same shocked silence ...

Longer
...

Freezing,
horrible silence!

Impish
Krasnegarians were less easily aroused than their paler-skinned countrymen. Her
new euphoria sank into dread. She saw her tiny amateur rebellion being stomped
to bloody pulp by those ruthless young professionals up in the castle. She saw
her own armed jotnar victorious but turning on the imps in civil war. She saw
all kinds of disaster.

“What,
cowards?” she shouted. “I have fifty jotnar behind me. Will none of you come
also to avenge your sisters and your daughters?”

Muttering
...

Hononin
the hostler, to your right, said the invisible guide.

“Master
Hononin? Where is your loyalty?”

The
wizened old man clambered to his feet, more bent and wrinkled even than she
remembered. His eyes glinted angrily at being thus singled out. “I am no
fighter, Princess.”

“Queen!”

“Queen,
then.” He looked unconvinced.

“And
neither am I, but I am Holindarn’s daughter, and I am not a coward! Sometimes
we must all stand up for the Good.”