Hearts in Cups (44 page)

There was a chuckle
from the one mage who had not yet spoken to them. "And yet, you come here
asking us to use our arcane powers to help you?" His amusement was plainly
derisive.

"Malvasius!"
Urien's rebuked his compatriot mildly. "Malvasius is right," he said,
returning his attention to them. "Even if we were willing to break our
charter, you are asking us to give you what is essentially an unfair advantage.
The use of arcane energies in such a negative sphere as war would have severe
repercussions. There are very few who could handle such power wisely and not
have it turn back upon them." His face became remote and severe.

Tired and discouraged,
knowing that further argument was pointless and not wanting to offend their
hosts, Colin bowed his head in resignation. "We thank you for allowing us
to stay among you for the time being, until we can decide what we must do
next."

Urien nodded, contented
that they had accepted his decree. "Go now and refresh yourselves from the
rigors of your journey. Within these walls you are secure." Bowing to the
masters, Colin and Dinea left the room.

Once outside, a novice
was found waiting to take them to the room that had been readied for them while
they talked with the masters. As in their student days they were housed in simple
dormitory rooms much like everyone else who dwelt here, saving the masters.
Pushing the two single beds together in the room that they were shown to, so at
least they would have the comfort of sharing a bed, they spoke little as they
readied themselves for sleep. Both were too tired and too depressed by the
negative response of the masters to want to discuss anything further that
night. For now, they were in a safe harbour and would wait until morning to
look to the future.

Chapter 20

Ian spent most of the
morning at Swordmaster Griswold's side, seeing to the fortifications of Castle
Lir. The news that had reached him three days ago from Morna was disheartening
in the extreme, and he was beginning to feel the unrelenting weight of his
responsibilities threatening to overwhelm him. He had seen the contempt in his
grandfather's eyes when he gave over the command of Langstraad's troops sent to
aid Creon. He did not bother to try to explain why he was sending less than
Branwilde asked for, nor did he offer excuses for not leading the army himself.
He simply and curtly gave his grandfather the orders as the Duke Regent of
Langstraad to his vassal, the Baron de Medicat. If his grandfather and
Branwilde wanted to assume that he acted out of cowardice, then they would have
to live with that assessment. Ian had far more urgent problems to cope with.

Word had come from
Morna that the army led by the Earl of the Inner Ward, larger and better
equipped than originally thought, had crossed over the border and was in the
process of invading Langstraad. Ian had sent contingents north to help Alwyn's
forces, if they could; and to fall back, resorting to ambush, attack and
retreat strategies, if they could not join with Morna's army. Then came the
news of Alwyn's defeat and Idris' surrender of her castle. Knowing that Brescom
would now spearhead his army south towards Castle Lir, Ian had feverishly been
working to evacuate all of his people from the path that the enemy would cut
through northern Langstraad and to ready his own castle for siege.

Presently the castle
was filled to capacity with frightened villagers and their animals. Dame
Edwinna was in charge of finding space within the castle to house these victims
of the greed of powerful men. Ian had charged his personal secretary and acting
seneschal, Squire Alaric, with finding tasks for the new residents and speeding
the evacuation of children and those who could not hold up to the stress of a
long siege to places of refuge far back in the mountains. Like a hive of bees
making ready to withstand a harsh winter, the halls and rooms, the courtyards
and the great field swarmed with constant activity.

As he strode across the
field at Griswold's heels, Ian could see that the older man was looking forward
with a certain relish to the coming assault. The old warrior barked orders as
they marched along, peering into every open doorway and assuring himself that
all that could be done to ready themselves was so being done.

"You see lad...I
mean, m'lord," Griswold said with a vast wave of his arm. "Castle Lir
has never been taken in all the ages that it has stood here. She's completely
impregnable!" He beamed at this witticism, to which Ian offered a wan
smile. Griswold tended to forget that Ian was now the acting duke, and now he patted
the duke on the shoulder and genially continued enumerating the remarkable
defenses of their citadel. For the most part, Ian was happy to let the
swordmaster use his knowledge as he saw fit. Ian only asked that he be kept
informed of what was being done.

Together they stood and
observed a band of men, attired in green with shortswords at their sides and
cross-bows slung by leather thongs over their backs, riding in through the
northern gate. Griswold raised his hand and one of the riders, catching his
signal, turned his horse and brought the company to a halt before them. The
rider dismounted and Ian saw by his badge of office that he was the captain of
this company. With respectful bows to both men, the captain quickly gave them
the most recent news from the north. The baroness' castle in Morna was said to
have been fired by Brescom's army as they prepared to move south, and Lady
Idris was known to be his hostage, though whether she traveled with the army or
had been sent in custody into the Inner Ward or to Pentarin was unknown. The
captain and his men were part of a larger company sent north by Sir Owain,
Lir's Master of Horse, to harry the Inner Ward's forces. They had come across
the hostile army a day's ride south of Morna's border with central Langstraad
making a straight line for Castle Lir. They reported that Lord Brescom's men
were well disciplined and well trained. That, and their patent interest in
moving south as quickly as possible, attributed to the general lack of damage
being done to the countryside and the people as they passed through. The
members of the company had split up, fanning out in small groups through the
hills, to begin persistent raids against the flanks of the army as it moved
south. Like mosquitoes in a swamp, they attacked, drew small amounts of blood
and then retreated. The invaders, however, were bullishly ignoring them as they
continued to push ever nearer to their goal.

His final piece of
news, before being sent to find food and shelter for his men and horses, was
that the vanguard of the army was now within half a day's march of Castle Lir.
After the captain and his men departed, Griswold fixed Ian with a sharp look.

"Well, this be it
then. We'd best be bringin' the last of them in an' sealin' the doors."

Ian's mouth pulled down
in a grimace of anticipation and annoyance. "I'd hoped that we would have
another couple of days to prepare," he muttered. "It irks me to have
to hide like this behind walls, doing so little."

Griswold's strong white
teeth showed above his fringe beard. "Oh, t'will not be so little that we
will be doing. The earl will be forced to sit here on our doorstep instead of
marching south to join his master. We'll be able to pick them off from the
walls and our men will continue harassing them from without. It's not the best
of situations but," here he shrugged his massive shoulders, "t'will
do until the fortunes of war change sides." With this bit of enigmatic
philosophy, Griswold took his leave and Ian trudged wearily back to the castle.

When the Earl of the
Inner Ward came to Castle Lir he found it shut fast and tight against him. A
wall of rocks and arrows was poured upon his army to remind them to keep their
distance from the massive stone walls. Retreating out of range, Lord Brescom
sat on his horse, looking out at those walls, buttressed against the mountain,
and planned his siege. He knew, through his spies, that the new duke regent had
not gone south with his army to aid Creon, but was holed up within the castle;
which bespoke, to one of Brescom's temperament, a fair amount of pusillanimity.
Ordering his army to spread out, forming a net to catch any who might venture
forth from the gates, the earl sent for an envoy to convey his ultimatum to
those cloistered within the castle.

The message was delivered
under the white flag of parley but an answer was not immediately forthcoming
when it was discovered that Lord Ian was not in any of his accustomed places
within the castle or its grounds. Griswold, who had received the earl's
courier, left the man under the watchful eye of the Captain of the Gate and
carried the sealed missive himself up to the main castle. But even within the
confines of the castle's keep his lordship's current whereabouts were a
mystery. Finally Griswold tracked down Ian's secretary, Alaric, who admitted
having been with his lordship earlier in the day but had no notion as to where
to find him now. A search was begun, but after an hour's hunting he was still
missing.

Griswold became
anxious, not entirely for Ian's safety but because he guessed the content of
the message and felt that a delay in answering was a betrayal of indecision and
weakness on their part. Thus, when Dame Edwinna returned from questioning the
servants in Ian's personal quarters, Griswold asked for an audience with the
lady of the castle. For several seconds Edwinna stood blinking in confusion at
him. "Do you mean the Lady Angharad?" she asked incredulously,
thinking that perhaps she had misunderstood him.

"Aye, she's his
wife and that makes her the castle's lady," he replied impatiently.

Refraining from
expressing her doubts about the girl's exact position in the castle's
hierarchy, let alone her competence to deal with the matter Griswold carried
with him, Edwinna went off to find and inform the girl that the Commander of
the Garrison wished to speak to her. She found the lady of the castle in her
rooms, listlessly gazing out of a window, an activity that Edwinna had
surprised her at many times. Angharad's face turned from boredom to
bewilderment as Dame Edwinna discharged her errand.

"But why talk to
me?" she asked, echoing Edwinna's precise thoughts when that lady had
finished.

"Because Lord Ian
cannot be found," Edwinna sniffed.

Angharad was about to remark
that she had never been consulted before this simply because Ian was
unavailable, but held her tongue. Ever since she had been brought to the castle
and installed in her rooms she had been treated like a child. She could have
most anything that she ordered, catered to as she was by a staff of servants
who were considerate to the point of condescension. Left alone in her rooms to
brood, she had pitied herself, casting herself in the role of a friendless
outcast caged in a silk prison. Ian had kept the bargain that they had agreed
on and, she was forced to admit, he treated her politely when they met, but she
knew that he, like the others, saw her only as a child to be humoured. When she
saw that the castle was being fortified, she was too isolated and too proud to
ask questions, so that the only information she had of what was happening, came
from surreptitious bits of gossip gleaned from the servants. From what little
she had overheard, she realized that the situation within the Pentarchy was
collapsing, just as Ian had predicted and her father had feared.

Mustering her dignity,
Angharad asked to be conducted to the commander. Edwinna said nothing, merely
bowing and furtively looking down the side of her nose at Angharad's
uncharacteristic bout of initiative.

The man that Angharad
was ushered before struck her at once as being exceptionally large of body and
voice. He seemed to be at least the size, in girth and height, of a full-grown oak
tree, and his voice boomed loudly in her ears as he explained his situation and
the need for a speedy response to the earl's courier. Swallowing her
misgivings, Angharad held out her hand for the letter and broke the seal
herself. Within, she was confronted with a demand for the Pretend Duke of
Langstraad to immediately surrender the castle or suffer its total destruction.
After reading it, she glanced up to find Sir Griswold waiting in polite
silence. She was somewhat startled as she realized that, unlike Dame Edwinna,
this overwhelming person was regarding her quite seriously and expected to act
on her orders.

"Lord Brescom's
army is now at our walls?" she inquired in her soft voice. The fear that
she suddenly felt was not of the unseen army, but of disappointing this giant
of a man who was not treating her as either an imbecile or a child.

"Aye, they're here
but t'will do them no good if we dinna open the doors for them," he
answered with a great laugh. "Someone's not been keeping you much informed
of the state of the castle recently," he went on to say, his shaggy
eyebrows drawn together in concern.

Angharad forbore
telling him that no one kept her informed of anything happening inside or out
of the castle. Instead she asked whether a reply was expected in writing. With
a grin indicating that he saw a jest, one that she did not, he replied that
"telling the dog to begone" would nicely tweak the earl's nose. By
this, Angharad understood that a verbal reply would imply that Brescom was
suppliant to their superior position.

Taking a moment to
phrase her answer, she tilted her head up to look Sir Griswold in the eye and
replied in the regalist tones that she could summon: "Let the Earl of the
Inner Ward know that never will the right-wise Head of a Great House deign to
even consider such an absurdity. He is trespassing onto land where he is not
welcome and does not belong. Tell him that he is ordered to leave the Duchy of
Langstraad and return to his own foul den immediately." When she had
finished, there was a wicked gleam of amusement mingled with approbation in his
eyes.