Hearts in Cups (42 page)

With a premonition of
the scorn with which Branwilde would treat his reply, he picked up his pen and
wrote his reply. In it he offered to send a force composed of mounted knights,
men at arms and a contingent of archers, all under the command of his
grandfather. He informed his fellow duke that he would remain in Langstraad,
directing the defense of its borders and keeping the Earl of the Inner Ward
from attacking Branwilde's army from the rear. Finally, he offered his
suggestion that Branwilde wait and lure Niall's army into Creon, where he could
set up an ambush for him in the mountains. Setting his seal to this, Ian rang
for Alaric in order to see that his reply was sent immediately to Gwenth. Then
he prepared another letter to his grandfather, informing him of these
decisions.

Chapter 19

Dressed in black and
red, Niall Alcuin de Brennin, Duke of Mirvanovir and self-proclaimed High King
of the Pentarchy, rode forth with Lord Oswith, his commanding general, to
review the army and to see for himself the amount of damage inflicted on the
city by his men. After the initial pillaging, mostly consisting of randomly
breaking into and looting houses and shops and abusing the few citizens that
were unlucky enough to be caught, most of the soldiers had wandered back out of
the city to the encampment that had been set up in the fields that surrounded
the city. Private boats, animals and stores of food had been summarily
commandeered by the invaders. Broken and battered stonework, the uprooting of
gardens and a general accumulation of trash littered the streets. The officers
in charge had detailed soldiers into work groups to return to and clean the
mess that they had made, so that the city was beginning to gain a semblance of
normalcy. Even some of the citizens, those that saw ways to refill their own
pockets with some of what had been stolen from them, began cautiously to
return.

Niall was perturbed
about the amount of destruction that had been done to his city, but Oswith
assured him that not only had no irreparable harm been done, but that the
damage was quite light in comparison to other cities that he had seen
plundered. "After all, your grace, only the public sector was misused; the
palace and its environs were completely untouched."

Once the men returned
to it, the camp had been set up in an orderly fashion. Everywhere banners
displaying the black swan of Mirvanovir and the red stag of Tuenth fluttered in
the least vestige of a breeze. Niall stopped to watch a group of mounted
cavalry drilling in a large field, the horses stopping, wheeling and charging
in formation. As he rode through the camp he was greeted with cries of
adulation. A victorious army loves its commander.

"Well,
Oswith," he said to the man riding at his side, "are we ready to take
the war into Creon?"

"The army is ready
to march at a word from you," his general replied deferentially.
"Frankly, your grace, the sooner we march the better it will be for the
men."

Niall tried to ignore
Oswith's use of his old title in preference to his recently claimed one of
“majesty;” he could not afford to alienate his Lord General at this crucial
juncture. Oswith went on, "It would be best for us to meet whatever army
Creon is going to send against us, either in the Silvarluin Valley or on the
plains of Carmathon within Creon's borders. The one thing we should avoid is
fighting our way through the mountains to get to them."

Niall agreed with this
opinion. "Our sources say that Branwilde is assembling an army of his own
people together with troops from Langstraad. I have not heard from Aidan of
Thurin, but I suspect that he will join with Branwilde; his wife is from Derwan
and sister to Creon's duchess." He drew his brows together in
concentration. "Brescom should have launched his effort into Morna four
days ago, which will turn Langstraad's attention to the north. They will not be
adding too greatly to Branwilde's forces with war coming to call upon their own
borders. I want our army to be ready to march by the end of the week." He
looked inquiringly at Oswith, who replied with a sharp nod. "Good. Lord
Blaise and his troops will remain here until the end of the following week and
then march west into Langstraad.  There he will meet up with Brescom's
troops and together they will take Castle Lir."

"And
Pentarin?"

"My duchess will
be left in command here," Niall answered. "We will leave sufficient
troops to ensure the peace, but she has other means at her disposal to defend
the city should our plans go awry and an attack on the city be attempted."
If Niall noticed the tightened lips and clenched hands on the reins of his
general's horse he said nothing, but he did smile to himself. This brusque
military man would attack and kill without remorse or fear, but the mere
mention of Arcana filled him with superstitious dread. It was Rashara's idea to
emphasize her arcane powers to the army so that her authority with them while
he was away would be strengthened. He was not entirely comfortable with her
argument. Perhaps it was about time to find out just how potent a personal
weapon his own House Power could be, he reflected grimly.

Only this morning
Rashara had been questioning him about House Powers and their uses. He was reluctant
to tell her much; partly it was vanity and the feeling of exclusivity that he
harboured about the subject and partly it was simply that he did not know that
much about his own powers. House Powers were arcane and hereditary and each of
the four Great Houses was elementally aligned: Mirvanovir to water, Creon to
air, Tuenth to earth and Langstraad to fire. Exactly what the Royal House of
Sandovar was aligned to or how the individual House Powers worked, he did not
know. He only partially understood the nature of the power residing within
himself, despite having had gone through the ceremony that keyed him to House
Mirvanovir when he became duke. When Rashara started asking questions that he
did not know the answers to, he always became touchy. Even now he was irritated
by the persistence of her most recent bout of questioning and the exposure of
his limited knowledge in contrast to hers in matters arcane.

He turned his horse and
began to ride back towards the city. Well satisfied with the condition of his
men, he was looking forward to the next stage in his campaign. He did not fool
himself that defeating Branwilde was going to be an easy task, but he did not
think that it was beyond his capabilities or his army's. If Branwilde's forces
were not beaten by his own here in Sandovar, then Niall would push them back
into Creon where his troops would be joined by those under his son, Galen, and
his general, Lord Raney, coming north from Challis, as well as the troops of
the Earl of the Inner Ward and the new Duke of Tuenth coming south after
subduing Langstraad. In the end Branwilde would be defeated, Niall’s claim to
the High Kingship would be confirmed, and the Pentarchy would be his. Filled
with a sensation of his own puissance, Niall rode cheerfully through the gates
and into the palace courtyard.

Niall, riding at the
head of his army, had only just disappeared from sight when Rashara received a
visit from Blaise in her private apartments. Their behaviour since the duchess'
arrival in Pentarin had been most circumspect, above suspicion of any kind.
Rashara made certain that she and Blaise were never alone together and treated
him with the cool friendliness with which she treated all of Niall's friends.
For his part, Blaise remained courteous but distant to her, even going so far
as to mention fictitious current liaisons to Niall to avert mistrust. Their
careful maneuvering had paid off as an unsuspecting Niall took leave of his devoted
wife and loyal confederate.

After assuring herself
that they would be undisturbed for the remainder of the afternoon, Rashara took
him into her bed where they proceeded to renew their intimate acquaintance.
Somewhat later and in very good humour, they lay and talked of those subjects
that had been strictly taboo in Niall's company.

As Blaise detailed his
successful bid for his father's dukedom, Rashara listened in apparent
admiration. He told of enlisting the active support of those barons he could
sway and the gradual extinction of those opposed to him. His only failure in
that regard was in not finding and killing his brother, Hywell. Rashara agreed
that Hywell needed to be destroyed, but thought that it was a matter that could
wait until the rest of the Pentarchy had been subdued.

Lazily her hand moved
over the firm, youthful muscles of his chest, comparing it to Niall's aging
skin and greying hairs. Her pleasure in Blaise made her own body soft and
pliant in response, but the mind behind her beautiful face remained hard and
bright. She had worked industriously, in her own way, for the luxury of being
able to lie here now, for all intents Queen of Pentarin Palace, and she was not
about to trade Niall's dominance for Blaise's. She was almost finished with
Niall. Once he defeated Branwilde and his allies, he would have outlived his
usefulness to her. Tired of his pettiness, his temper, his conceit and his age,
Rashara had plans of her own to hatch.

Blaise began to stroke
her again, arousing her to vent the passions accumulated in the boredom of
Niall's bed. If for no other reason than this, Rashara considered letting
Blaise survive once Niall was gone. He was handsome and he was young, two of
her prime considerations in a lover, but Blaise had much more than that to
offer her. When he lay exhausted at her side again, she let him sleep while she
stared dreamily at the ceiling. When she had told Niall not to look to the mage
masters for help, she neglected to add that she still had fairly regular
contact with at least one of the powerful members of that arcane hierarchy.
Over the years, she and her former mentor had exchanged information on an
infrequent but relatively consistent basis. Interested in, among other esoteric
subjects, the powers of the Great Houses, her former mentor had been one of the
prime reasons that she had continued to question her husband about his powers,
in spite of the fact that it provoked him and had led to friction between them
in the past. Raising herself up on one naked arm, she thoughtfully scrutinized
her sleeping lover's face. He was an ap Halberstad, son of Tuenth's late duke,
who had been head of a Great House and, presumably, had wielded that same sort
of arcane power that Niall did. The question was whether this very handsome and
willing young man possessed those powers himself. If he did and she could keep
him bound to her, then there was an opportunity for her to not only use those
powers through him but to perhaps barter the knowledge with her former mentor
for his aid as well. Pleased with the possibilities that she saw before her,
she decided to let Blaise sleep a little longer while she worked on the details
of her plan.

"What do you know
about the House Powers?" she asked Blaise casually while dabbing at her
mouth with a napkin. They were both dressed again, and sat at a table in her
rooms on which a lavish dinner had been laid.

Blaise, apparently
ravenous after his exertions of the afternoon, took a long drink of red wine
and speared a tender chunk of meat with the point of his knife before looking
up at her. "Little, except that Tuenth's Power is in the earth and that my
father made scant reference to it, at least in my hearing." He neatly
deposited the meat in his mouth and began to chew.

"I believe that
it's usually held by the ruling duke or duchess of a Great House," she
persisted in a silken voice.

He swallowed and drank
more wine. "True.  However there is some sort of ceremony that has to
be performed in order to use the power. Hywell was the one designated with the
potential. Why do you ask?" He stopped eating and regarded her with his
attractive eyes. Like a cat, she noted dryly to herself, only she was no mouse.

She took her time,
sipping her wine speculatively. "I'm curious as to why, having assumed the
title and office of Duke of Tuenth, you did not go on to perform this ceremony
and confirm yourself as ruler of House Tuenth?"

"Because Hywell is
still alive." A spasm of exasperation crossed his face. "I told you
that he was the designated heir. I can't take on the power of House Tuenth
until he is dead. That's one reason your husband was more than a little put out
when I told him that Hywell was still walking about with his head on his
shoulders."

"Over the past few
years, I've made something of a study of the House Powers and, from what I have
deduced, all members of the direct family line have the potential to assume or
use the House Power. It seems, that being so, then more than one person might
be able to use these powers at a time." She watched him carefully as she
delivered this little speech. He was not slow and she saw that he immediately
caught the import of what she was saying.

"If you are right,
I could wield the powers of House Tuenth even if Hywell is still alive."
 

"Yes, it would
seem so."

"How certain are
you?" He was staring at her with the beginnings of a smile creasing the
corners of his mouth.

"Nothing, my dear
young man, is a certainty." She laughed and finished the contents of her
glass. "However, I would not suggest this possibility if I did not have
good grounds to do so."

"But," he
said with a groan, "the instructions are locked up in Rengard Castle and I
have to leave for Langstraad at the end of next week."