The Warlock in Spite of Himself - Warlock 01 (27 page)

authority is not absolute, that there are checks upon her power; but she is the sovereign, and must not be torn down!'

Anselm made a gurgling sound, his face swollen red and his eyes starting forth from their sockets, choking with rage; then he managed to speak, fairly stuttering in his wrath.

'Nay now! Now I say nay! A woman for a sovereign? 'Tis a mockery! And a whoring, arrogant bitch of a-'

'Be still!' Loguire thundered, and even the four great lords shrank away from the savage power of his voice.

As for Anselm, he fairly cowered, staring appalled at the white-bearded giant before him, who almost seemed to swell and tower higher as they watched.

Then, slowly, and with greater dignity than Rod had ever seen in a man, the true regal dignity that only comes unaware, Loguire resumed his seat, never taking his eyes from his son. 'Retire to your chambers,' he said in a cold, still voice. 'We shall speak no more of this till the conclave at sunset.'

Anselm somehow managed to summon the strength to lift his chin again, a gesture that somehow seemed pompous and ridiculous, and turned on his heel. As he stalked to the door, his eyes fell on Rod. Rage and humiliation boiled up in him, and he swung up his arm to favor the minstrel with a backhanded slap.

'Nay!' barked Loguire, and Anselm froze.

'This man,' said the Duke, speaking in centimeters, 'has spoken truth. I will not have him maltreated.'

Anselm locked glares with his father; then his look faltered, and dropped. He turned away: the door slammed behind him.

'Minstrel,' rumbled Loguire, 'play!'

Rod let his fingers ramble through 'The Old Man of Tor Tappan' while he reflected.

So there would be a council of war tonight, eh? And the main issue would apparently be constitutional monarchy versus warlordism, though only he and Durer might know it. Well, he knew which side he was on. He looked again at the straight-backed old Duke, eating token bits of food, lips pressed tight under his flowing white beard, brow locked in a slight scowl, only the slightest hint of his grief showing in the deep, shadowed eyes.

Yes, Rod knew which side he was on.

They met in the great hall, large enough to act as a hangar for a goodsized spaceship, if the Gramarians had known what a spaceship was. The stone floor was inlaid with Loguire's coat of arms. Great silver sconces supported torches every yard or so along the walls. The ceiling was concave and gilded, with an immense silver chandelier suspended from its center. There were no windows; but that made little difference, since night had fallen.

Loguire sat in a great carved chair at one end of the hall, bunting of his family's colors draped on the wall behind him. His chair was raised on a four-foot dais, so that the standing lords must look up at him. There were a good many of them, not only the twelve greats, but with them a host of counts, barons, and knights, their vassals. And at each one's elbow stood, or rather hunched, a thinfaced, bony little man, with scant light hair lying close against his scalp. Rod surveyed the hall; his lips pursed into a soundless whistle. He hadn't realized the councillors were so numerous, There were at least fifty, maybe seventy.

And there might be more outside his field of view. At the moment, be had literal tunnel-vision, and one-eyed at that. The torches that illuminated the hall sat in sconces that were held to the wall with three rough bolts.

But one of the sconces behind Loguire's throne was missing a bolt, and the stone behind it was bored through for an inch, then hollowed out to the depth and width of a man's head. 'The head, at the moment, was Rod's, where he stood in the clammy darkness of a narrow passage behind the wall.

His peephole afforded him an excellent view of the back of Loguire's head, and some nice over-the-shoulder shots of anyone addressing him. His right hand rested on a lever; if he pushed it down - if it wasn't rusted tight - the stone before him should swing wide to make a handy door. From the looks on the faces of the lords confronting the Duke, it might be very handy.

The man immediately in front of the Duke was Anselm. Bourbon and di Medici stood at either side of the young man. Durer, of course, stood at Loguire's left hand.

Loguire rose heavily. 'We are met,' he rumbled. 'Here in this room is gathered all the noble blood of Gramarye, the true power of the land.'

He scanned the faces before him slowly,' looking each of his brother Great Lords directly in the eye.

'We are met,' he said again, 'to decide on a fitting rebuke for Catharine the Queen.'

The Duke of Bourbon stirred, unfolding his arms and setting his feet a little further apart. He was a great black bear of a man, with shaggy brows and a heap of beard on his chest.

His fists clenched, his mouth tightened. There was something furtive, sheepish, in his stance.

He glared at Loguire. 'Nay, good Uncle, you have the wrong of it. We are met to say how we may pull her down, she who would trample upon the honor and the power of our noble Houses.'

Loguire stiffened, his eyes widening in outrage. 'Nay!' he choked,

'there is not cause enough...'

'Cause!' Bourbon straightened, his black beard jumping with his jaw.

'She hath taxed our lands more heavily than ever in the traditions of our lore, and wasted the substance upon the filth and dirt of peasants; she sends her judge amongst us every month to hear complaints from all the manor, and now she will appoint her priests within our lands - and we have no cause? She robs us of out rightful rule within our own demesnes, and then upon this all insults us to our faces by hearing the petitions of besotted beggars ere she will bend her ear to ours!'

Di Medici had bent to listen to the slight man at his elbow; now he straightened, smiling faintly, and murmured, 'And was it custom, ever, for a monarch to receive petitions from his peasants within his own Great Hall?'

'Never!' thundered Bourbon. 'But now our gentle monarch will place the rabble thus before us! And these, my reverend Duke, be but the greatest of her enormities, and the atrocities she hath wreaked upon the custom of the land. And this while she is but a child. What will she do, my lord, when she is grown!'

He paused for breath, then shook his head and growled, 'Nay, good coz!

We must needs pull her down!'

'Aye,' murmured di Medici, and, 'Aye,' declared the other lords, and

'Aye' rolled through the hall and swelled, till the word came full, clamoring from every throat, again and yet again.

'Aye!' and 'Aye!' and 'Aye!'

'Now I say nay!' Loguire roared above them all.

The hall fell still. Loguire drew himself up to his full height and breadth, looking more a king than duke.

His voice was only a little calmer, falling like the toll of a battle tocsin. 'She is the sovereign. Capricious, aye, and arbitrary, hot and headstrong, aye. But these are faults of youth, of a child who must be taught that there are limits to her power. We must now show her those limits that she has exceeded. That may we do, and nothing more. Our cause does not admit of further action.'

'A woman cannot rule wisely,' murmured di Medici's councillor, and di Medici took it up: 'My good and gentle cousin, God did not make Woman wise in ruling.'

Bourbon took his cue. 'Aye, good Uncle. Why will she give us not a king? Let her marry, if she doth wish this land well governed.'

Rod wondered if Bourbon was a disappointed suitor. There was something vaguely lecherous about him, and nothing at all romantic.

'The rule is hers by right!' Loguire rumbled. 'Hers is the blood of Plantagenet, the Crown of this land since its birth! What, good nephew, have you so easily forgotten the oath you swore in fealty to that good name?'

'Dynasties grow corrupt,' muttered Bourbon's councillor, eyes gleaming.

'Aye!' Bourbon bellowed. 'The blood Plantagenet has thinned and soured, good my lord!'

Ah, so! Rod thought. He's not an uncle any more. 'Weakened sore, my lord!' Bourbon ranted. 'Weakened till it can no longer sire a man, but only a woman, a slip of a girl, with a woman's moods and whims, to reign! The bloodline of Plantagenet is worn and spent; we must have new blood now for our kings!'

'The blood of Bourbon?' Loguire lifted an eyebrow, his smile contemptuous.

Bourbon's face swelled red, eyes bulging. He had begun to splutter when di Medici's voice interposed itself smoothly.

'Nay, good cousin, not the blood of Bourbon. What throne-blood should we have but the noblest in all the South?'

Loguire stared, the blood draining out of his face in shock and horror.

'I will not!' he hissed.

'Nay, my lord, and this we knew.' Di Medici went wilily on. 'Yet must we have good blood, and a man of courage and decision, a man of youth who knows what must be done and will not hesitate to do it.'

His voice rose. 'What king should we have but Anselm, Loguire's son?'

Loguire's head jerked as though he had been slapped. He stared, his face paling to a waxen texture, taking on a-grayish hue. He reached behind him with a palsied hand, groping for his chair, and age draped heavy on his shoulders.

He lowered himself to the edge of the seat, leaning heavily on the arm. His vacant eyes sought out his son, then turned slowly from side to side.

'Villains!' he whispered. 'Bloody, bawdy villains! And thus you steal my son...'

Anselm's chin was lifted in defiance, but guilt and fear had hollowed his eyes. 'Nay, my lord, I was with them from the first.'

Loguire's empty eyes sought him out again. 'But thou, even thou...'

His voice strengthened. 'But it is, thou more than any. Above all, it is thou!'

Durer now stepped forward, away from Loguire, to take his place by Anselm's side, his smile split into a grin of triumph. Loguire's eyes gradually focused on him. Their eyes met, and held. A slight rustle passed through the hall as all the councillors craned for a better view.

'Nay,' Loguire whispered, 'it was thou.'

He straightened slowly. Then, deliberately and slowly, he looked each Great Lord in the eyes once more. His eyes turned back to Durer.

'You are all of one mind.' His voice had gained strength, but it was the strength of bitterness and contempt. 'The debate has been before this, has it not? For you are all agreed; each man among you has quarreled with his conscience and won over it.'

His voice hardened even more. 'What wasp has flown among you, to sting your souls to such accord?'

Durer's eyes snapped fire. His mouth broke open for retort; but Loguire cut him off.

'Thou! Thou from the start! Thou calmest to me five years ago, and I, aged fool, thought "Well and good"; and as thy bastard, cringing servants crept one by one into our households, still I rejoiced - poor, aged, doddering fool!'

He lifted his eyes to seek out Anselm's. 'Anselm, who once I called my son, awake and hear! Beware the man who tastes thy meat, for he it is who best may poison it.'

Rod suddenly realized how the meeting would end. The councillors couldn't risk leaving L1pguire alive; the old man was still strong and vital, still indomitable. He just might be able to sway the lords to loyalty again. The chance was slight, but definite, and Durer couldn't afford it.

Anselm straightened his shoulders, his face set with rebellion. He clapped a hand to Durer's shoulder, not noticing that the little man's teeth grated as his jaws clamped shut.

'This man I trust,' he stated in what might have been intended to be ringing tones. 'He was with me from the first, and I welcome his wisdom

- as I will welcome yours, if you are with us.'

Loguire's eyes narrowed. 'Nay,' he spat. 'Away with you, false child, and your tongue of treachery! I had sooner die than join you.'

'You shall have your preference,' Durer snapped. Name the manner of your dying.'

Loguire glared, then threw himself to his full height in one lurching motion.

Anselm stared, then reddened. 'Be - be still, Durer! He is -is a fool, aye, and a traitor to the land. But he is my father, and none shall touch him!'

Durer's eyebrows shot up. 'You would harbor snakes within your bed, my lord? Naetheless, it is the wish of all the nobles, not yours alone, that must be done.'

He raised his voice, shouting, 'What say you, lords? Shall this man die?'

There was a moment's pause. Rod rested his hand on the door-lever; he had to get Loguire out of there. He could open the door and pull Loguire into the passage before anybody realized what was happening . .

.

But could he close it before they came running? Probably not; there were just too many too close. And Durer, at least, would react very quickly.

If only the hinges and springs were in decent shape! But he had a notion they hadn't been too well maintained in the last few centuries. A chorus of reluctant 'Ayes' rolled through the great hall. Durer turned to Loguire, bowing his head politely. 'The verdict, my lord, is death.'

He drew his poniard and started forward.

And the lights went out.

Rod stood a moment in the total blackness, stunned. How...?

Then he threw his weight on the lever. He jerked out his dagger as the stone slab groaned open. Act now, understand later. The grating of the stone door broke the instant of shocked silence. Pandemonium struck as every voice in the hall started shouting - some in anger, some in distress, some calling for a porter to bring a torch. The noise would be a good cover. Rod lunged out of the passage, groping blindly till he slammed into somebody's rib cage. The Somebody roared and lashed out at him. Rod ducked on general principles, felt the blow skim his hair. He flicked the button on the handle of his dagger and identified Somebody as the Duke Loguire in the flicker of light that stabbed up from the hilt.

A kindling-wood, twisting body struck into Rod with a howl of rage. Rod gasped and stumbled as steel bit into his shoulder. Apparently Durer had seen the flicker of light, too.

The dagger wrenched itself out of Rod's shoulder; he felt the warm welling flow of the blood, and rolled away.

But the scarecrow was on him again. Rod groped, and by great good luck caught the man's knife-wrist.