Homage and Honour (9 page)

Custom and
protocol demanded that it should be the Lord of the House that must
welcome honoured guests and not the Lady.

The Brentwood
family had arrived the previous day and Eloise had housed them in
the Dower House, some miles from the manor proper. The
Crown-Prince’s party was to lodge in the manor itself and Eloise
and her servants had been working hard to prepare the
accommodation. It was no mean feat to arrange suitable rooms for
the numbers expected and the manor was not the largest of the van
Buren residences.

What was she to
do? Her son Raoul was with his father and neither knew that the
Crown-Prince had arrived sooner than expected.

Her daughter
was bobbing with excitement at her side and Eloise hushed her with
a look.

Her
uncle-in-law limped towards her, calming her, settling the nervous
servants. He even went as far as to prod the younger Eloise with
his walking stick. Eloise stood still immediately.

“That’s
better,” he growled, “don’t show us up girl.”

He addressed
Duchess Eloise, “since my nephew is detained, I believe I’m the
only one of the family here to do the honours.”

“Would you?”
gasped Eloise with relief, “I don’t know where Raoul has got to and
this marriage is so important to him.”

“I’ve been
watching my relations doing this for years now, first my
grandfather, then my father, brother, nephew. Nice to get the
chance myself before I’m too old and stiff to manage a bow without
falling over.”

He looked at
his mother, the Dowager Duchess Anne and laughed, it was an old
joke. He was fifty-six, his mother eighty-one, he walked with a
stick and she had none, being as spry as she had been at fifty and
contrived to look very like her great-granddaughter, despite the
difference in age.

It was a large
party approaching the manor, not only Crown-Prince Elliot, his wife
the Crown-Princess Gemma and their four children, but also Prince
Elliot’s uncle Prince Brandon, his wife Princess Jennifer and
their
two children, Brandon and Jennifer. Also accompanying
them were ladies-in-waiting and gentlemen-of-the-bedchamber. When
you added the servants, no wonder Duchess Eloise had been hard-
pressed to fit them all into the manor. The old wing that had not
been used since King Elliot the Third’s time had been pressed into
service.

Everyone in the
royal party was in boisterous high spirits at the prospect of an
extended visit away from the often stifling atmosphere at Court.
Lady Eloise too, had the reputation of being a fine hostess.

The men led the
cavalcade mounted on the best riding horses the royal stables could
provide, followed by the carriages containing the ladies. They
pulled up inside the courtyard and the van Buren family watched as
their occupants began to spill out, the royal children with noisy
anticipation, their elders with more decorum.

Count Wolfram
limped forward as the gentlemen began to dismount.

“Welcome my
Lord Prince,” he began, “welcome to my nephew’s manor.”

“No formality
Wolfram,” protested Elliot with a laugh, “Raoul promised me. Where
is the rascal anyway?”

“Urgent call
from his Overseer,” Wolfram replied, his voice muffled somewhat as
he tried to prise himself up from the bow the Crown-Prince had
interrupted. That accomplished, he stood aside to let Elliot
precede him into the house, indicating to Duchess Eloise and the
other ladies not to come forward with the traditional curtsies.

“Not this
time,” called out Elliot so all could hear, “this time we are your
welcome guests, no more, here to celebrate the nuptials of the
happy couples. Rank is of no import.”

Duchess Eloise
bobbed a short bob, noticing that the Prince appeared to have
brought with him only three of his Gentlemen-of-the-Bedchamber
although the ladies (if the number of carriages were anything to go
by) had not seen fit to copy him. She thanked her foresight in
getting ready some more chambers in case of need.

Wolfram ushered
the male guests inside as the fifth carriage began to empty. Out
stepped the Contessa Elisabeth Graham, the Royal Governess,
identical two-year-old girls by her side, the Princesses Susan and
Anne. Next to emerge was a jolly-faced nursemaid carrying the baby,
Princess Natalie. Finally the six-year-old Prince Elliot jumped
down. With a squeal of delight, he headed for the younger Eloise
van Buren, his cousin Brandon’s bride. Eloise had been at Court,
his mother’s youngest lady-in-waiting and Eloise told good stories.
He had missed her when she had returned home to prepare for her
wedding and was delighted that she was to join his family at
Court.

Eloise bent
down to receive and give the hug expected on such a memorable
occasion.

The boy was
bubbling over in his excitement as he launched himself at her.

“Eloise, how I
have missed you.”

“And I you
little one.”

“I wish it was
me marrying you.”

Eloise laughed,
“I’m too old for you sweetheart.”

“But I love
you.”

An embarrassed
Eloise looked up at Crown-Princess Gemma. Elliot hadn’t given her
any chance to curtsey her respect but young Elliot’s mother laughed
it off.

The children
and female guests followed their menfolk through the great polished
doors in a chattering, happy throng.

“I’m glad your
husband decided to hold the nuptials here and not at the castle,”
Gemma was telling Duchess Eloise as she surveyed the great
bedchamber the Duke and Duchess had vacated in her honour.

“I much prefer
it here,” Duchess Eloise confided, “though it’s been difficult to
keep it cool in this heat. I hope you’ll be comfortable.”

“I’m glad to be
with Elliot,” Gemma smiled, “court protocol is an insidious thing.
Our bedchambers at the palace are quite a distance apart. The
children?”

“Eloise is
taking them to the nursery. She told me Prince Elliot has been most
anxious to see it. The rocking horse is, I believe, the greatest
attraction.”

“He has talked
of little else these last days,” answered the Princess.

“Can I send one
of the servants for refreshments?”

“No need,”
answered Gemma, “I know from your daughter that you live the
informal life here, I’ll come down to your dining chamber.”

When the ladies
arrived downstairs, the house servants were putting the finishing
touches to the light meal sitting on one of the tables.

“We don’t have
a High Table here,” explained the nervous Duchess Eloise, “we all
sit together, the children too.”

“Even better,”
smiled Gemma.

King Elliot V’s
Court was and always had been ultra-formal. Royal children were
kept strictly to the Royal Nursery where the Royal Governess
reigned supreme over the children and their ‘Companions’.

At six years
old, Prince Elliot was about to welcome his own ‘Companions’, boys
of noble birth who would share his education. Five young boys had
been selected, their fathers delighted at the opportunities such an
appointment presented. For those of lesser rank it was a route to
power and influence that might not otherwise be attainable. The
King remembered and rewarded his own boyhood friends. One of them
had been the Baron Alan Ross, the recently retired (due to
ill-health) Lord Marshall and that honour had been passed on to his
son Philip who had been one of the Boy Companions to the present
Crown-Prince.

Young Elliot
was full of talk about these delights to come as his soon to be
Aunt Eloise led him, his sisters and their attendants down to
dine.

The Lord Duke
Raoul and his son did not return to the manor until late
afternoon.

Young Raoul
followed his worried father into the study, sending a maid
scurrying for his mother and shedding his outer tunic as he
went.

The elder Raoul
had barely greeted his breathless wife before he asked. “When did
the royal party arrive? The Brentwoods, have they left the Dower
House at all? Hurry woman, this is important.”

“The
Crown-Prince and his family arrived some candlemarks ago,” Eloise
faltered, “My Lord Duke Brentwood, I haven’t seen, he said they
were tired from their journey and wanted to rest though I believe
they are to attend the evening meal.”

“They must not
come here. Keep them at the dower house, send a servant and order
him not to go in, but to return immediately after he has delivered
the message.”

“Why?”

It was not like
her husband to issue orders in such a peremptory way. Their
marriage had been arranged by their respective families but, after
many years of marriage, love had grown between man and wife, not
always the case in the Kingdom of Murdoch.

“Pestilence,”
he announced in a grim voice, “in the slave barracks.”

Eloise gasped
as her hand went to her mouth. “Is it bad?”

“Eight dead and
more than double that number sick. I’ve sent word to the Little
Sisters asking for their help.”

“What,” she
stammered, “what kind of pestilence is it? The red-pox?” She was
racking her brains trying to remember just what medicinal supplies
were in the manor stillroom.

“None like
anything I’ve seen before,” he answered, shedding his own dusty
tunic.

“What are the
symptoms?”

It was at that
moment that their son Raoul coughed. As he took his hand away from
his mouth, both parents saw that the skin was speckled with tiny
droplets of bright red blood.

Duke Raoul’s
face went as white as a sheet. “The Crown-Prince and his family
must leave within the candlemark,” he declared, “hopefully they
will not have come in contact with any infection.” He and no other
knew then just how contagious the disease was and how it could be
passed from one to another with a fleeting skin contact or a
sneeze.

It was already
too late.

Young Raoul
died late the next day and by then his sister Eloise was
complaining of feeling unwell and so were many of the servants. The
Duchess Eloise collapsed the day after.

By then the
Crown-Prince, his family and attendants had left the stricken manor
for the royal palace, hoping in vain that they had escaped
infection. The Crown-Prince’s son, the six-year-old Elliot, had
spent most of the afternoon sitting on the Contessa Eloise’s knee
whilst she told him stories and she had been as infectious as could
be.

Five days after
their return to the royal palace, the Contessa Elisabeth Graham,
the Royal Governess in charge of the royal nursery reported to
Crown-Princess Gemma that the little boy appeared to be off-colour,
even feverish and that she had moved him to a room apart from the
other children. A nursing sister from the Order of the Little
Sisters of the Poor had been summoned to the sickroom.

After this
announcement she swept out of the solar and back to her charges
informing her employer that she should stay away. Princess Gemma
however, chose to ignore the Contessa’s advice and sped after her,
intent on looking after her beloved son herself. She was by his
side when he died. She nursed the two-year-old twins Susan and Anne
and baby Natalie when they too fell sick. She was not aware, when
first Princess Natalie then Princess Anne followed their brother
into the deep void that was death, that she was dying herself.

Of the happy
group of royal and noble visitors that had entered the van Buren
manor the previous tenday, all but three had fallen ill of the
sickness, fourteen had died and that was not counting the servants
and other attendants. The disease in its turn infected the palace
staff and a full third perished.

The King did
not fall sick, but the only one of his immediate family to survive
was his granddaughter, the two-year-old Princess Susan and she had
changed from a jolly, bouncing toddler to a frail little mortal who
looked as if a puff of wind would be the end of her.

It was not only
the privileged personages from the houses of royalty and nobility,
together with their servants who were affected by the disease.

Although the
government tried to curtail the spread of the disease by setting up
a restricted zone within a fifty mile radius of Fort, the disease
continued to spread and outbreaks were reported for some further
tendays, some as far away as the Duchies of Graham and Duchesne in
the north-east although a full ninety per cent of the deaths
occurred within the area around Fort.

Not a single
noble house was unaffected and the Court entered a period of
deepest mourning on the orders of a distraught king.

Princess Susan
continued to cling to life, much to the relief of the nobility and
the people. Her health, however, continued to give cause for
concern and to make some ambitious men think overmuch about future
possibilities.

* * * * *

Quartet (1)

“What is your
initial assessment of the new crop of cadets?” asked Weaponsmaster
Rhian of her instructors.

“A mixed bag,”
said Ryzcka Ranolf, Officer in Charge of the Junior Cadets.

“More mixed
than usual,” said Weaponsecond Danel, “two of them have no more
idea about the military and swordsmanship than, why travelling to
the moon!”

“You mean
Cadets Petar and Beth I presume?”

“Yes and what
price Beth? Rob says too that her lesson knowledge is almost
non-existent. She’s virtually illiterate.”

“Petar?”

“What he knows
he knows well enough according to Rob, these northern religious
communities may be peculiar but they do teach their children how to
read and write,” Danel answered, “but Beth, why she can’t count
beyond twenty. It’s most strange, what’s her history? From her
accent I presume she comes from one of the islands?”

“I thought that
at first,” interjected Ranolf, “the speech pattern is similar, she
drawls her words same as those few islanders I’ve met but it’s not
precisely that either. I meant to go and check her records but I
haven’t had the time.”