Paladin of Souls - Lois McMaster Bujold [92]
After a moment of silence, she gave Ista a sidelong look. “Funny old man, Goram. He wanted to know if a royina outranked a princess. Because a princess was the daughter of a prince, but you were only the daughter of a provincar. And that Roya Orico’s widow Sara was a dowager royina more recent than you. I said a Chalionese provincar was worth any Roknari prince, and besides, you were the mother of the royina of all Chalion-Ibra herself, and nobody else is that.”
Ista forced herself to smile. “Royinas do not often come in his way, I expect. Did your answers pacify him?”
Liss shrugged. “Seemed to.” Her frown deepened. “Isn’t it a strange thing, for a man to lie stunned like that, for months?”
It was Ista’s turn to shrug. “Palsy-strokes, broken heads, broken necks . . . drownings . . . it happens that way, sometimes.”
“Some recover though, don’t they?”
“I think those that recover start to do so . . . sooner. Most struck down that way do not live long thereafter, unless their care is extraordinary. It’s a slow, ugly death for a man. Or anyone. Better to go swiftly, at the first.”
“If Goram cares for Lord Illvin half as well as he cares for his horses, perhaps that explains it.”
Ista became conscious that the runty man himself had emerged from the corner chamber and hunkered down behind the balustrade, watching them. After a time he rose, came down the stairs, and crossed the court. As he neared, his steps shortened, his head drew in like a turtle’s, and his hands gripped one another.
He stopped a little distance off, bent his knees, and ducked his head, first to Ista, then to Liss, then back to Ista again as if to make sure. His eyes were the color of unpolished steel. His stare, from under those bushy brows, was unblinking.
“Aye,” he said at last, to a point halfway between the two women. “She’s the one he was going on about, no mistake.” He pursed his lips, and his gaze suddenly fixed on Liss. “Did you ask her?”
Liss smiled crookedly. “Hello, Goram. Well, I was working up to it.”
He wrapped his arms around himself, rocking forward and back. “Ask her, then.”
Liss cocked her head. “Why don’t you? She doesn’t bite.”
“ ‘B ‘n ‘t,” he mumbled obscurely, glowering at his booted feet. “You.”
Liss shrugged amused bafflement and turned to Ista. “Royina, Goram wishes you to come view his master.”
Ista sat back and was silent for a long, withheld breath. “Why?” she finally asked.
Goram peered up at her, then back down at his feet. “You were the one he was going on about.”
“Surely,” said Ista after another moment, “no man would wish to be seen in his sickbed by strangers.”
“That’s all right,” Goram pronounced. He blinked, and stared hard at her.
Liss, her eyes crinkling, cupped her hand and whispered in Ista’s ear, “He was more talkative in the stalls. I think you frighten him.”
Articulate smooth persuasion, Ista thought she might resist. In this odd tangle, she could hardly find an end. Urgent eyes, tongue of wood, a silent pressure of expectation . . . She could curse a god. She could not curse a groom.
She glanced around the court. Neither midnight nor noon, now; no details matched her dreams. Her dream had held neither Goram nor Liss, the time of day was all wrong . . . maybe it was safe, benign. She drew a breath.
“So, then, Liss. Let us renew my pilgrimage party and go view another ruin.”
Liss helped her up, her face alert with open curiosity. Ista climbed the stairs upon her arm, slowly. Goram watched her anxiously, his lips moving, as if mentally boosting her up each step.
The women followed the groom to the end of the gallery. He opened the door, backed up, bowed again.