Part 33 (1/2)
”He said he wants to feel your blood on his hands.”
”I know. I was there. But he will not want it less for being bound. He talks of honor; let us see if he will give his word, and keep it.”
”And if he does not?”
”He has no weapons, and no poison on him; he has been bathed and dressed in our garments. Aside from that, if he wants to fight me barehanded and is foolish enough to do so here-I am not incapable.”
”I know, my lord king, but your life is our responsibility.”
”You will be within call.”
”We should be in the room with you. What if he calls up an evil demon?”
Kieri shook his head. ”He could have done that to escape those who captured him. Let us not make up trouble for ourselves. Just outside the door will be well enough; he can't lock it against you.”
He moved to the door himself, hearing approaching footsteps. The king, under close guard, was coming down the pa.s.sage. He wore the garments he'd been offered, a velvet tunic over heavy wool trousers and low soft-soled boots. He stopped abruptly when he saw Kieri.
”You!” he said in Common. ”You are the king? You lied to me.”
”No more than you to me,” Kieri said, ”when you sent that old woman to spy at my coronation and she said you wanted peace. She should have described me better.” The king said nothing. Kieri went on, this time in Pargunese. ”You spoke to me of honor. If you give your word that you will not attack me while we talk, you will not be bound, and my Squires will leave us alone. Will you?”
”Why should I?”
”Because, if I wished it, you could be bound like a herdbeast and killed, or locked in a cell. If you are intent on killing me, you will have time. If there is a way of having peace between our people, yours and mine, I want to find it. And you will be more comfortable unbound.”
”I cannot swear never to kill you.”
”No one could swear that,” Kieri said. ”That is not what I ask. Swear not to attack me for one turn of the gla.s.s.”
”And then you will kill me?”
”Not if I can avoid it,” Kieri said. ”Though I do not expect you to believe it.”
The king looked at the King's Squires to either side of him, and shrugged. ”It makes no difference, I suppose, one gla.s.s. You can lie, and I will listen, if that is what you want. But one of us will die, and if it is I, your land will suffer.”
”If either of us dies, both lands will suffer,” Kieri said. ”My people would like to hear you say it in Common, if you will.”
The king uttered an oath in Pargunese, then said in Common, ”I have given my word not to attack your king for the full turn of a gla.s.s. I would see the gla.s.s.”
”Here it is,” one of the Squires said.
The king looked, and nodded. ”Well, then. I am ready.”
”Come in,” Kieri said. ”And be seated.” He waved at the chair, and the king sat in it, gingerly at first, and then leaned back.
”It is too soft,” he said. ”A man would learn to slump in such a chair.”
”My apologies,” Kieri said, sitting in his own. ”I was thinking of your long ride. I can have someone bring a hard one.”
”No matter. Have your say; perhaps in this soft chair I can sleep and not listen to your lies.”
”If you are trying to anger me,” Kieri said, ”and force me to fight you, that will not work.”
”Will it not? I had heard you were a man easy to anger, quick to take offense.”
”Perhaps I was once, but I am trying to learn better,” Kieri said. When the king said nothing, he went on. ”Until I came here, I knew nothing of where your people came from. I did not know you were Seafolk from over the eastern sea.”
The king opened one eye. ”Did you not? It is common knowledge with us. Where did you think we came from?”
”I suppose I thought you were mixed mageborn and old human, like most of those in the Eight Kingdoms.”
”Mixed! We do not mix, and certainly not with magelords. You drove us out of our homes, and then, here, attacked us again.” The king leaned forward. ”And then, not content with attacking us, confining us to colder, less fertile land north of the river, you despoil my daughter.”
”You sent her here,” Kieri said. ”Why?”
”My first wife's sister thought you might have changed, and of my daughters, Elis was the strongest...you had wed one of your soldiers before.”
”She told me you had promised her a home far in the north, where she could live unmarried.”
The king waved his hand. ”It was a girl's fancy. And yet, I might have let her-she had frightened away several suitors-but when you came, I thought, if she and you wed, it might bring peace. Worth more than a girl's daydream, if that could be.”
”Um.” Kieri nodded at the pitcher on the table. ”There's water, if you want it.” The king shook his head. ”Elis told me you gave her a knife-a poisoned knife-to kill me on our wedding night. That if she did so, and escaped, you promised to let her live as she pleased.”
The king looked the way Kieri had felt when Elis told him. ”She-she said what what? I gave her no such knife!”
”She had such a knife. She told me where her escort kept it. I had their things searched, and it was there. She said she'd been forbidden all weapons but that, and that only after our wedding.”
”I did tell them not to let her have weapons. She is a wildcat; she might have attacked her own escort.” He scowled. ”But I never gave her a poisoned knife to use on you, much as I wish you dead. And Elis...I cannot believe she would lie about that. Who told her?”
”She said her escorts told her it was your command. And it is her escorts, is it not, who reported to you that she had been dishonored?”
”Yes...” Now the king looked thoughtful.
”Tell me,” Kieri said, ”why you came alone, in disguise, instead of sending an envoy, or coming in person, openly. It is not a kingly act.”
”It is my my disgrace. disgrace. My My honor. My brothers-my sister-sons-all said so, and the challenge was given. It is our way.” honor. My brothers-my sister-sons-all said so, and the challenge was given. It is our way.”
”I do not understand,” Kieri said, though he was beginning to guess. He needed better than a guess.
”A leader protects his people. If he cannot protect them, he is no better than a slave...someone will challenge for leaders.h.i.+p, and either they fight for it or the others vote...it depends on the issue.”
”And they challenged you because your daughter stayed here?”
”Because you sent her to that place of infamy.”
”To us,” Kieri said, ”it is a place of honor, where Knights of Falk are trained.”