The Black Raven - Katharine Kerr [135]
Bellyra sent one of her servant girls off to find a page, and him she sent off to find Maddyn. Although she couldn’t receive the bard in the women’s hall, she saw nothing wrong with standing just outside the open door and talking with him in the corridor. When she explained her new venture, he seemed genuinely pleased to be invited along.
“Our prince thinks I need guarding,” Bellyra said.
“Treasures should be guarded, Your Highness,” Maddyn said. “And a treasure you are.”
“Oh, get along with you! What’s this? The wars really must be over, if silver daggers are turning into courtiers.”
Maddyn laughed. “Maybe so,” he said. “But I’ll be honored to be your guard, Your Highness.”
“Splendid! What I want to do first is just walk around and see everything. Such as the bolthole. Maryn’s told me about the silver daggers opening the gates.” She felt her sunny mood disappear. “My heart aches, thinking of your losses. I’ll write about Caradoc in my book, so he’ll be remembered.”
Maddyn’s eyes filled with tears. Hastily he turned away, wiping his face on the sleeve of his shirt. The silver dagger device embroidered there, she realized, summed up his life, his honor, and his loyalties beyond even those he paid to her husband. Losing so many comrades must have wounded him worse than a sword.
“My apologies, Your Highness,” he mumbled. “You took me by surprise, like.”
“None needed. I know you honored the captain. So did my husband, and he’s told me that he misses Caradoc still.”
“Well, so we all do.” Maddyn managed a smile. “My thanks for the honor you’ll be paying him.”
“Most welcome. I’ll get my cloak.”
Bellyra returned to the women’s hall to find Degwa, standing off to one side but close enough to the door to hear anything that might have been said. Degwa dropped her a distracted sort of curtsy.
“I’ll be back in a bit,” Bellyra said. “Make sure nothing happens to my parchments.”
“Of course, Your Highness. They’re ever so lovely.”
When she left the broch with her silver dagger in attendance, Bellyra took a pair of the youngest pages with them as well, as much to give the boys a chance to run around and play as for the propriety of the thing. Maddyn led her through the maze of walls, sheds, towers, and wards to the ruins that hid the bolthole. Men of the fortguard stood on duty there all day and all night, matched by another guard far away, inside the ruins where the escape tunnel debouched beyond the dun walls.
“Our prince is talking of rebuilding that dun and settling it upon some particularly loyal lord,” Bellyra told him.
“That’s a good idea, Your Highness,” Maddyn said. “It would be a fitting demesne for Branoic, if I can presume to offer my advice.”
“You may. It’s a good idea. I’ll mention it to the prince.”
“We’d best do somewhat about getting Branoic and his lady married soon,” Maddyn went on, “before he gets her with child. Well, if he hasn’t already.”
“Oh indeed? And why are you worrying about that?”
“There are nights when he doesn’t sleep in the barracks, and Branoic’s never been a man for sleeping out in the rain. One of the other lads twitted him about it, and I had to step between them. Branno was ready to kill him over the insult to his betrothed.”
Bellyra smiled, and this time her wicked feeling had little of the pleasant about it. Revenge upon her husband tasted sweet, but beyond that Lilli’s unfaithfulness to Maryn had its practical advantages. The prince would tire of Lilli sooner or later, no doubt, but now, when she had a child, there’d be no talk of it being another royal bastard. Having one of those out in fosterage was quite enough.
It also occurred to her, as they walked through the sunny ward, that Lilli was young, so dreadfully young that she might well not realize just how dangerous her situation was, caught between two men like the hull of a boat twixt rocks. Since she could hardly warn Lilli herself, she decided to send Elyssa for as honest a talk as Lilli would allow.
Nevyn set the wood box in the center of his table, then opened his dweomer sight and inspected each etheric seal.