Fire Dragon - Katharine Kerr [60]
Isn't this interesting? Nevyn thought. She may well be tired of him. How odd! I always thought it would be the other way round.
Carrying their bedrolls, laughing and talking at the tops of their lungs, the silver daggers trooped into their barracks. Maddyn had never been so glad to see his fellow riders. His long ordeal by lonely silence was over at last. He even had to admit that he was glad to see Owaen, who grinned at him and threw a friendly punch his way.
“So, bard,” Owaen said. “Here you've been, lapping up the comforts of the dun like the dog you are, and we've been riding all over the blasted kingdom.”
“Some comforts!” Maddyn said. “The barracks didn't stink as much with you all out of it, though.”
They shared a laugh. Owaen tossed his bedroll down on the bunk and his saddlebags on top of it. “You look well,” he said.
“I'm over that cursed poisoning, if that's what you mean,” Maddyn said. “I hope to every god I never feel that way again.”
“So do I. It wasn't much of a pleasantry to watch, either.”
“So will we be in quarters all summer now?”
“We won't.” Owaen shook his head. “Once the priests have proclaimed him king, Prince Maryn wants to ride out to deal with those bandits. That's right, you don't know this. You'd left by the time we learned how many of them there are—far too many. They're a vicious lot.”
“Then we'd best slaughter them all.”
“My thought exactly. Let's head for the great hall. I want ale.”
Riders from the various lords' honor guards mobbed the great hall, whilst the lords themselves clustered around the prince over at the table of honor. Owaen and Maddyn stood near the door on the riders' side of the hall and looked around for a servant lass to bring them ale. Or Owaen did; Maddyn was watching Princess Bellyra, sitting next to her husband, one hand on his sleeve, smiling at him as if her face would break from it. With a shrug he turned away in time to see Tieryn Anasyn bearing down on him like a charging warrior, his face set and grim.
“Owaen, Maddyn!” Anasyn called out. “Have you seen my sister?”
“Lady Lillorigga, Your Grace?” Maddyn said. “I've not.”
“I just went to her chamber and she wasn't there.” Anasyn scowled at the stairway as if to hold it responsible. “I thought she'd be in attendance upon the princess, but she's not there, either.”
“Off with old Nevyn, most like, Your Grace,” Owaen said. “He hates crowds and suchlike.”
“Ah. Of course.” Anasyn briefly smiled. “Well, I'll wait, then. I want a word with her, but I'm not going to disturb the old man over it.”
The tieryn strolled away, still scowling.
“What was that all about?” Owaen said.
“Cursed if I know.”
“Oh.” Owaen considered this for a moment. “Who can figure out why the noble-born do what they do?” He shrugged the problem away. “The ice in the hells will melt before one of these scabby lasses gets around to serving us. I'll go fetch the cursed ale myself.”
Maddyn leaned back in the curve of the wall and watched him plunge into the crowd like a swimmer into rough water. Across the hall, Bellyra sat gazing up at Maryn in wifely devotion. He tried looking elsewhere, but always, it seemed, some dweomerlike power drew him back to watching her. He considered leaving the great hall, but just as Owaen returned with two tankards of ale, Bellyra stood up, glancing around her. He saw her speak briefly to Maryn, then gather her women around her and head for the staircase.
“What are you looking at?” Owaen said. “Are you going to take this blasted tankard or not?”
“My apologies,” Maddyn said. He took the tankard and had a sip. “I just noticed that the princess looks unwell again.”
Owaen looked where he pointed. “She does, at that. The noise in here won't help.”
“Just so.” Maddyn had a long swallow of ale. He would get drunk, he decided. It was as good a way to spend a feast as any, and then perhaps he could stop remembering her mouth on his, and the way she'd clung to him.
Bellyra was expecting that Prince Maryn would preside over the feast until late, but it was still early when he came to the bedchamber he shared