The Black Raven - Katharine Kerr [155]
“There’s our lady,” Maddyn said. “A silver dagger’s work is never done, eh?”
“Better you than me,” Trevyr said, “tramping around in this cold.”
“Lucky dog! Well, I’ll join you at the fire soon enough.”
Maddyn grabbed his cloak and put it on, then hurried to the foot of the stairs. When Bellyra reached the great hall, he knelt, but she laughed and waved a hand at him.
“Do get up, Maddo! That straw’s too mucky to kneel in.”
Smiling, he rose and bowed to her. “Her Highness is too kind.”
“Not truly.”
Her voice held an odd note, a hesitance perhaps. When he looked at her he saw something new in her expression, an ill ease of a sort he couldn’t place. In all their other times together she had shown nothing but the graciousness of a great lady to a trusted servant. With the pages so close by, he could say nothing, but when they walked out into the ward the lads ran on ahead, as Bellyra generally allowed them to do.
“Have I displeased Your Highness?” Maddyn said.
“What? Not in the least!” Bellyra laughed a few brittle notes. “What makes you say that?”
“I don’t know, my lady. Forgive me.”
In silence they crossed the ward. The pages would dart ahead like dogs, then run back to circle the princess before they rushed off again. Bellyra hesitated, looking downhill through the jumble of buildings and walls, then pointed off to her right.
“Let’s go through that gate,” she said. “Someone told me there’s a dedication stone from an old tower that’s been used in another wall. I think they meant down in there somewhere.”
They went through the gate, hurried past pigsties shaped like beehives, followed a broken wall downhill, found another gate, and came out into a squarish little ward, defined by the stone walls of storage buildings. Bellyra stood looking around her. On the far side stood a long barn.
“There!” Bellyra pointed up toward its eaves. “Just under the thatch. Look, you can see writing on that big stone.” She trotted over to the base of the wall and stood staring up, frowning a little. “It’s too high for me to read.” She turned to the waiting pages. “Do you either of you know letters?”
“I don’t, my lady.”
“Nor I either, my lady.”
“What a nuisance! Here, I know! You two lads run back to the royal broch. I saw some empty ale barrels standing by the servants’ door. You roll one of them down here so I can stand on it.”
“Your Highness!” Maddyn said. “You can’t go clambering about on ale barrels.”
“Can you read, Maddo?”
“I can’t.”
“Well, then, there’s no use in your doing the clambering for me, is there now?”
Maddyn glowered. Bellyra sent the two pages off, then moved a few steps away from him and watched them go. The hood of her cloak had slipped back to reveal her golden hair, caught back in a silver clasp, but in the cold light both seemed as dull as lead.
“Elyssa said she had a bit of a chat with you,” Bellyra said abruptly.
“She did, my lady. Your secret’s safe with me.”
“Thank you.” She turned to face him. “I never doubted it. But she also told me—” She broke off, staring up at him as if she were trying to read his thoughts through his eyes.
Maddyn realized that he could remember nothing more about that talk with her serving woman at the same moment as he realized he desperately needed to.
“Forgive me, my lady,” he said, “for being such a dolt, but have I done somewhat to distress you?”
“Not in the least. Rather the opposite, actually.”
“Well, that’s a relief.”
“I suppose it is.” Bellyra hesitated for a moment. “Maddo, are you in love with me?”
Maddyn felt his face burn beyond the power of the winter wind to cool it. He groped for words, found none, could only stare at her helplessly while she studied him with all the fierce concentration she brought to her beloved stones and inscriptions.
“Oh dear Goddess!” Bellyra said. “You are. I didn