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I stood there, cold, my bladder too full, a tremble in my limbs, turned in heartbeats from the king of seven nations bound for Congression to a scared child once again.
The guard captain of the Ancrath column applied his mailed knuckles to the wood. ‘Honorous Jorg Ancrath requests audience.’
I wanted to be anywhere else, but stepped closer. None of the guard but the captain had dismounted to prevent violence. Either they didn’t know the stories men told of me, or they didn’t care. Perhaps they saw their job as retribution for breaking pax rather than prevention of such breaches.
The door opened and from the dark interior emerged a slim and pale hand. A woman’s hand. I stepped forward and took it. Sareth? Father had brought his wife?
‘Nephew.’
And she stepped out onto the riding board, all whispering silks and stiff lace collars, her hand cool yet burning in my grip. The carriage behind her lay empty.
‘Aunt Katherine,’ I said, my words once again in short supply.
17
Six years had only made her the more beautiful. What Katherine Ap Scorron hid in dreams stood before me on a cold day at the edge of winter.
‘Katherine.’ I still held her hand, raised between us. She took it back. ‘My father sent you to Congression? In his stead?’
‘Ancrath is at war. Olidan stays with his armies to ensure that the war is not lost.’
She wore black, a flowing gown of it, satin folds reaching to a broad hem of black suede from which the mud might be brushed when dry. Lace around her neck like ink tattoos, earrings of silver and jet. Still mourning her prince.
‘He sent you? With two voting seals and no advisors.’
‘Nossar of Elm was to come but he fell sick. I have the king’s trust.’ She watched me, hard eyes, her lips a tight line in a pale face. ‘Olidan has come to appreciate my talents.’ Half a challenge – more than half. As if she might favour father over son and replace her sister at his side.
‘I’ve come to appreciate your talents myself, lady.’ I sketched her a bow if only to gather my thoughts. ‘May I offer you a place in the Renar carriage? Father’s repairs to this one seem to have been poorly judged.’ I drew on Brath’s reins bringing him close enough that she could mount from the riding board.
Katherine left the carriage without further encouragement, stepping up to ride side-saddle to accommodate the length of her dress. For one moment satin lay taut across the jut of her hipbone. I wanted her for more than the shape of her body – but I wanted that too.
Kent dismounted quick enough so that I could take his horse and ride with Katherine back along the column. I rode close, wanting to speak but knowing how weak my words would sound.
‘I didn’t mean to kill Degran. I would have fought to save him. He was my—’
‘And yet you did kill him.’ She didn’t look my way.
I could have spoken of Sageous but the heathen had only put the rope in my hands, the fact he knew someone would get hanged hardly excused me. In the end I could only agree. I did kill my brother.
‘Orrin also deserved better from his brother,’ I said. ‘He would have made a good emperor.’
‘The world eats good men for breakfast.’ She shook her reins to coax Brath a little faster.
The words sounded familiar. I kicked Kent’s horse and caught her. She pulled up beside Lord Holland’s carriage. ‘I didn’t know your tastes were so grand, Jorg.’
‘My wife’s choice,’ I said.
I nodded to the guardsman by the carriage door and he knocked to announce Katherine. His knuckles barely made contact with the lacquered wood before the door sprung open and Miana leaned out, dark eyes on Katherine, lips pursed. She looked unaccountably pretty.
‘I’ve brought you a midwife, dear – my Aunt Katherine.’
It’s my sincere hope that Katherine’s look of shock was more spectacular than the one I wore when taking her hand five minutes earlier.
I entered the carriage first and sat between the young queen and the older princess. I didn’t trust in Gomst to be able to stop the bloodshed should things go badly.
‘Queen Miana of Renar,’ I said, ‘this is Princess Katherine Ap Scorron, my father’s representative at Congression and widow to the Prince of Arrow. We met Arrow’s army two years back, you may recall.’ I waved a hand at the old men. ‘Osser Gant of Kennick, Lord Makin’s advisor, and of course you know Bishop Gomst.’
Miana settled her hands on her belly. ‘I’m sorry for your loss, Katherine. Jorg tells me he killed the man who murdered your husband.’
‘Egan, yes. Orrin’s younger brother. Though the best deed that day was in putting an end to the heathen, Sageous. He poisoned Egan’s mind. He wouldn’t have betrayed Orrin otherwise.’
I pressed back into the cushions. Two women, each given to speaking her mind and to trampling any social niceties that stood in their way, are wont to have short conversations that end interestingly. The fact that Katherine allowed for Sageous’s hand in Orrin’s fratricide seemed harsh when she gave me no room to hide in such excuses. In truth, though, I couldn’t hang my guilt on him.
‘The firstborn are often the best that the tree will offer,’ Miana said. ‘The ancients offered the first fruit to the gods. It might be that the first child carries whatever goodness their parents have to give.’ She laced her fingers over the greatness of her womb.
A slight smile touched Katherine’s lips. ‘My sister is the firstborn. Anything gentle or kind went her way rather than mine.’
‘And my brother who will one day rule in Wennith is a good man. Any wickedness or cunning that my parents had came to me.’ Miana paused as the carriage lurched into motion, all the columns starting to move now. ‘And you have Orrin and Egan to support my theory.’
‘Of course that would make Jorg the Ancraths’ paragon.’ Katherine glanced at Gomst who had the grace to look away. ‘Tell us, Jorg, what was William like?’
That surprised me. I had been happy letting them spar across me. ‘He was seven. It was hard to tell,’ I said.
‘Tutor Lundist said William was the more clever of the two. The sun to Jorg’s moon.’ Gomst spoke up but kept his eyes down. ‘He told me the child had an iron will such that no nurse could sway him from his chosen path. Even Lundist with his eastern cunning couldn’t divert the lad. They brought him before me once, a boy of six determined that he was setting off on foot to find Atlantis. I talked about his duty, about God’s plan for each of us. He laughed at me and said he had a plan for God.’ Gomst looked up but he didn’t see us, his eyes fixed on the past. ‘Blond as if he came from the emperor’s own blood.’ He blinked. ‘And iron in him. I believe he could have done anything that boy – had he been allowed to grow. Anything. Good or ill.’
My own memories painted a softer picture but I couldn’t dispute Gomst. When William set his mind, when he decided how a thing should be, there was no arguing with him. Even when Father was called upon he would hold his nerve. And despite what I knew of my father’s ruthlessness, when it came to William, it never occurred to me that the matter was yet settled even when we heard Father’s footsteps in the corridor. Perhaps the reason my father hated me lay as simple as that. I had always been the weaker of the two. The wrong son died that night, the wrong son hung in the thorns.
