“Yes. I don’t want to insult Xarabiss. I’ll be taking her with me, it helps give reasons for such a progress—a show of the land to my new bride. Thann Xa’ath should be flattered. None of the other women had such treatment.” Raldanash did not smile. His eyes seemed far away, held by distant things, that looked like vistas neither of concupiscence nor of war. “So I must give you another task, that of messenger to Ulis Anet. Go tonight to her apartments and tell her my news. She’s to be ready to leave once the morning’s ceremony is concluded.”
Rarmon allowed a moment or two to pass. Then he said, “It’s late. She may have retired.”
“Take a couple of guard with you, and a chamberlain, enough to make it formal. Wait for the women to fetch her. She should be told personally of the journey—but not the Karmian matter. I shall see to that later. And decorous apologies. You understand why I’m asking you to do it?”
Rarmon had ideas. He said, “No, sir.”
“Because etiquette demands someone of importance, while the fewer who are privy to the plan the better. Impress this also on my betrothed.”
“Yes, my lord.” Rarmon waited again, then said quietly, “and if she should wonder why on such a secret matter you yourself—”
Raldanash said flatly, “If I go myself, she’ll suppose I’ve arrived to claim betrothal rights in her bed.”
The frankness, rather than funny, was unnerving. Raldanash displayed no trace of anything, no self-consciousness, not even ruefulness.
It would be politic to say nothing.
Rarmon said nothing.
Outside, summoning two guard and sending for the chamberlain, Rarmon was aware of a further notion ranked with the rest. The King did not particularly want his latest wife, if he had wanted any of them. It might be convenient to fob her off with one’s dramatically important half-brother. Later, maybe, to discover the two of them, and have both executed. Rarmon could not assume Raldanash had learned his sexual preference, even after the psychic delving of the Amanackire. Incriminatory situations might, in any event, be stage-managed. Then again, Rarmon would not swear the King was capable of that. Actually, you could not be sure what the King was capable of, either for good or ill. His charisma was valid, but how he used such a utensil on the fields of life and kingship was not yet clear.
Turning from one gorgeous corridor to another, the chamberlain found his path blocked by the noteworthy son of Yannul, who—politely about to make way—perceived Rarmon and hailed him.
“Can I ask the favor of a word?” Lur Raldnor, now known as Lur Yannul about the palace, was a picture of casual equilibrium. His eyes looked into Rarmon’s and said This is vital and must be now. Rarmon stepped aside from the escort. He and Raldnor stood in the embrasure of a window.
“Is he going to Ulis tonight?”
“You mean Raldanash. No. I’m sent with a message.”
“Someone cast a rumor and has been spreading speculative gossip. The King’s reckoned to be rushing there to have his rights. Which is what Yeiza overheard.”
“Am I to take it the Princess isn’t alone?”
“That damnable clown Iros bribed a way in, through the garden. To get out he has to leave via the antechambers—guard changes—and the antechamber route, due to the rumor, is now awash with members of the entourage.”
“I see.”
“If there’s any hint she’s got a man with her now—you know the laws of Dorthar on adulterous treason. Raldnor just missed them by a dagger’s length, didn’t he?” Yannul’s son smiled, then laughed. Rarmon was not unimpressed by this actor’s camouflage. “Can you do anything?”
“Maybe. If neither of them panics.”
They beamed at each other and parted. Rarmon with his escort went on. Minutes later they were at the doors of the suite, the guards saluting. There were persons in the passage, too, hangers-on come to gawp.
When the doors were opened, Rarmon saw the interlinking anterooms were busy with people. Xarabian servants, even clerks loitering about, as if they might be needed to take letters. All of them looked disappointed not to have caught Raldanash in the act. Ulis Anet’s ladies, or most of them, were also to be seen. Luckily Yeiza, young and frightened though she was, had had the urge to come back.
The chamberlain announced Rarmon unnecessarily. The chamberlain portentously added that the Prince was here on the Storm Lord’s business. Everyone kept a straight face. Spoken in the theater, such words would have had the tiers in thigh-slapping uproar.
Rarmon intervened before the next speech. He thanked the concourse for attending, and dismissed them. His personal authority coupled neatly to his fame, and the rooms were nearly empty in less than a minute. Rarmon then addressed Yeiza, asked her to enter the bedchamber and represent him to her mistress.
There was the chance that Iros, being the impulse-ridden flamboyant he was, might rush from the room, flourishing a sword, sure Raldanash’s soldiers had come for him. But the murmurous noise had so far kept him pinned. Yeiza’s sinuous entry, drawing the inner door closed behind her, did not precipitate disaster.
Rarmon expected that Ulis Anet would master herself and come out, leaving the guilty evidence within.
He was surprised when Yeiza reappeared and said, “The Princess has not retired to bed, my lord. As the King’s brother and her illustrious kin, you may enter.”
This was all so absurd that for a moment he suspected the springing of a trap.
Then he walked into the bedchamber, wondering if Iros had been stuffed in a clothes closet, as in the sort of theatrical farce events seemed to be emulating.
But Iros was standing by the far wall in plain view. Ulis Anet, despite the lie garbed for bed, stood facing Rarmon. Yeiza shut the door, and leaned on it.
“As you see,” said the Princess, “we are at your mercy.”
Her voice was low, but not tremulous as Yeiza’s had been.
Noncommittally. Rarmon said, “I shall render you the King’s message. Then I’ll leave. You need not expect the King himself. In fifteen minutes it will be safe for the gentleman to depart. Using the anterooms, which I shall see are vacant, and wearing the unfashionable cloak I will have Yeiza send him. One more dawdling clerk.”
Iros swore, but had the sense to keep his voice down.
Ulis Anet did not take her eyes from Rarmon.
“You saved me from maiming and death during the earthquake. It must affront you to see me take such a stupid gamble as this.”
“Those risks you take voluntarily are nothing to do with me.”
“And this, my lord, had nothing to do with me.” She lifted her head and there was a tension to her eyes and lips. Again, unavoidably, he was reminded of Val Nardia, the uncanny physical likeness; but they were not the same. “Lord Rarmon, I feel I might trust you. I hope you’ll be my witness before this man that I didn’t invite him here, nor do I wish him here. In fact, my lord, I’m invoking your protection against him.”
Iros made a sound that was altogether too loud. He was gathering himself to speak or to shout, and Rarmon went to him and struck him across the head. Iros slumped back against the wall. Rarmon caught him by the throat.
“Be quiet. She denies you. You ventured this without her consent.”
Iros struggled, but his rage had grown flaccid. Rarmon let him go.
“The bitch can only deny me now, to protect herself.”
“Don’t call her names. If she’d cared to, she might have accused you of rape. If you’d valued her, you might have had the good manners to admit to it.”
Iros rubbed his jaw. He did not like his beauty bruised.
Rarmon said to him steadily, “I’ll be waiting for you in the North Walk, beyond the Fox Garden. Should you be late leaving here, I’ll be compelled to return. It will then have become a charge of rapine, for which you’ll answer to my own men.”