Cormyr_ a novel - Ed Greenwood [165]
The princess sighed. "You're right, Aunadar." She reached back and gently but firmly pushed away his massaging hands. "My thanks for that, but I must get dressed and get out of here. Even if I can't stop wizards from snatching Cormyr from me, I need fresh air and a place to walk and to be up doing something! I'm not going to lie in my bed until they come to turn me into a toad or charm me into marrying the noble of their choice or even-gods!-our Lord High Royal Magician himself!"
She stormed out of the room, hauling on the cord that summoned her ladies-of-the-chamber as she did so. "Step out into the receiving room, Aunadar," her voice came back faintly. "We're not officially betrothed yet, and I don't want people talking…"
From Dauneth's hiding place, the faint sound of Aunadar's assent drowned out her last words. They'd moved too far away for him to hear any more. Dauneth sighed, raked slivers of shattered mirror from his hair, took a last look through his spyhole, and crept away.
Someone else heard the faint sounds behind the wall and smiled. That would be young Marliir departing. She might as well follow suit.
The lady with eyes like flames spat out the rose she'd been absently toying with during her long, uncomfortable time curled up behind the wing tapestries of Tanalasta's bed. Its stem was almost chewed through. Emthrara, the Harper, sighed and dropped the rose, then rubbed at her aching back and slipped away.
When a maidservant came into the room a moment later with Tanalasta's discarded nightgown in her arms, she almost slipped on a rose lying on the floor. The servant picked it up and peered at it curiously. Someone had been chewing on the stem. She frowned, shrugged, and then carried it away for disposal, leaving the floor bare and unblemished once more.
Chapter 26: Death of Dhalmass
Year of the Wall
(1227 DR)
Rhodes Marliir, youngest cousin of a minor relative of a fallen noble house, stalked the streets of Marsember hunting for the King of Cormyr. In its sheath, his serrated dagger wept sweet poison.
The fall of Marsember had come within a generation of the establishment of Sembia's western border. Once the Purple Dragon established a permanent border with Sembia, the slow, continual tightening of his royal gauntlet around the port city began. Finally, just to stay free, the ruling Marliir family had been forced to publicly endorse the pirate trade in the city and to declare hostilities against the Forest Kingdom.
And that's when Dhalmass, mighty Dhalmass, the Warrior King of Cormyr, crossed the marshes and took the City of Islands.
Rhodes Marliir was nobility in name only. His immediate family was not within spitting distance of the Marsembian throne, but his was the only branch that had not perished battling the invading horde. And now, blade in hand, the young rogue was intent on exacting his revenge.
The remainder of the town was in celebration, which angered Rhodes even further. These were the merchants and smugglers and thieves and petty nobles, like the Eldroons and the Scorils, who had loudly encouraged the ruling Marliirs to stand firm against the Purple Dragon. Then these supposedly loyal followers deserted the cause when the king's forces first entered the marshes, and some-Rhodes suspected the treacherous Eldroon household-even guided the Cormyrean army through the tortuous byways of the marsh to the city's open gates. Now those traitors tooted silver horns and threw gaudy bits of paper to celebrate their new masters and Marsember's incorporation into the nation of Cormyr.
His uncles and great-uncles lay in Marsember Bog unavenged, along with the last of the Janthrins and the Aurubaens. Mighty Marsemban nobles all, who in life would not have allowed one such as Rhodes, born on the wrong side of the blanket to a poor relation, to pass through the door of any of their palatial homes. That did not matter to Rhodes. All he had gotten from his relatives was a noble name, and now, thanks to their bullheaded stubbornness, the power of that name was gone as well.
Still, Rhodes had his