“Where is the body? I would like to pay my last respects,” said Targonne in dirgelike tones.
He was led to the tent where Mina lay in state, guarded by a group of silent soldiers, who parted to allow him to pass. Targonne stuck a mental needle in several as he walked among them, and their thoughts were only too clear, only too easy to read: loss, grief, sorrow, white-hot anger, vengeance. He was pleased. He could turn such thoughts as these to his own purposes.
He looked down at the corpse and was not in the least moved or touched beyond an annoyed wonder that this hoyden should have managed to garner such a loyal—one might say fanatical— following. He played to his audience, however, and saluted her and spoke the proper words. Perhaps the men noted some lack of sincerity in his voice, for they did not cheer him, as he considered he had the right to expect. They seemed to pay very little attention to him at all. They were Mina’s men, and if they could have followed her into death to bring her back, they would have done so.
“Now, Dogah,” said Targonne, when they were alone inside the command tent, “relate to me the circumstances of this tragic business. It was the elf king who murdered her, or so I understand. What have you done with him?”
Dogah related laconically the events of the previous night. “We questioned the young elf—his name is Silvanoshei. He is a sly one. He pretends to be almost mad with grief. A cunning actor, my lord. The ring came from his mother, the witch Starbreeze. We know from spies in the king’s household that one of her agents, an elf named Samar, paid a secret visit to the king not long ago. We have no doubt that, between them, they plotted this murder. The elf made a show of being in love with Mina. She took pity on him and accepted the ring from his hand. The ring was poisoned, my lord. She died almost instantly.
“As to the elf king, we have him in chains. Galdar broke his jaw, and so it has been difficult to get much out of him, but we managed.” Dogah smiled grimly. “Would your lordship like to see him?”
“Hanged, perhaps,” said Targonne and gave a small, dry chuckle at his little pleasantry. “Drawn and quartered. No, no, I have no interest in the wretch. Do what you please with him. Give him to the men, if you like. His screams will help assuage their grief.”
“Yes, my lord.” General Dogah rose to his feet. “Now, I must attend to preparations for the funeral. Permission to withdraw?”
Targonne waved his hand. “Certainly. Let me know when all is made ready. I will make a speech. The men will like that, I know.”
Dogah saluted and withdrew, leaving Targonne alone in the command tent. He rifled through Mina’s papers, read her personal correspondence, and kept those that appeared to implicate various officers in plots against him. He perused the map of Solamnia and shook his head derisively. What he found only proved that she had been a traitor, a dangerous traitor and a fool. Priding himself on the brilliance of his plan and its success, he settled back in his chair to take a short nap and recover from the rigors of the journey.
Outside the tent, the three officers conferred.
“What’s he doing in there, do you suppose?” Samuval asked.
“Rummaging through Mina’s things,” Galdar said with a baleful glare back at the command tent.
“Much good may it do him,” said Dogah.
The three eyed each other, ill at ease.
“This is not going as planned. What do we do now?” Galdar demanded.
“We do what we promised her we would do,” Dogah replied gruffly.
“We prepare for the funeral.”
“But it wasn’t supposed to happen like this!” Galdar growled, insistent.
“It is time she ended it.”
“I know, I know,” Dogah muttered with a dark, sidelong glance at the tent where Mina lay, pale and still. “But she hasn’t, and we have no choice to but to carry on.”
“We could stall,” suggested Captain Samuval, gnawing on his lower lip. “We could make some excuse—”
“Gentlemen.” Lord Targonne appeared at the entrance to the tent. “I thought I heard you out here. I believe you have duties to attend to in regard to this funeral. This is no time to be standing around talking. I fly only in daylight, never at night. I must depart this afternoon. I cannot stay lollygagging around here. I expect the funeral to be held at noon as planned. Oh, by the way,” he added, having ducked into the tent and then popped his head back out again, “if you think you might have trouble lighting the pyre, I would remind you that I have seven blue dragons at my command who will be most pleased to offer their assistance.”
He withdrew, leaving the three to stare uneasily at one another.
“Go fetch her, Galdar,” said Dogah.
“You don’t mean to put her on that pyre?” Galdar hissed through clenched teeth. “No! I refuse!”
“You heard Targonne, Galdar,” Samuval said grimly. “That was a threat, in case you misunderstood him. If we don’t obey him, her funeral pyre won’t be the only thing those blasted dragons set ablaze!”
“Listen to me, Galdar,” Dogah added, “if we don’t go through with this, Targonne will order his own officers to do so. I don’t know what’s gone wrong, but we have to play this out. Mina would want us to. You are second in command. It is your place to bring her to the pyre. Do you want one of us to take over?”
“No!” Galdar said with a vicious snap of his teeth. “I will carry her. No one else! I will do this!” He blinked, his eyes were red-rimmed. “But I do so only because she commanded it. Otherwise, I would let his dragons set fire to all the world and myself with it. If she is dead, I see no reason to go on living.”
Inside the command tent, Targonne overheard this statement. He made a mental note to get rid of the minotaur at the first opportunity.
12
The Funeral
Pacing slowly and solemnly, Galdar carried Mina’s body in his arms to the funeral bier. Tears ran in rivulets down the minotaur’s grief-ravaged face. He could not speak, his throat was choked with his sorrow. He held her cradled in his arms, her head resting on the right arm she had given to him. Her body was cold, her skin a ghastly white. Her lips were blue, her eyelids closed, the eyes behind them fixed and unmoving.
When he had arrived at the tent where her body lay, he had attempted, surreptitiously, to find some sign of life in her. He had held his steel bracer up to her lips, hoping to see the slight moistness of breath on the metal. He had hoped, when he picked her up in his arms, to be able to feel the faint beating of her heart.
No breath stirred. Her heart was still.
I will seem to be as one dead, she had told him. Yet I live. The One God performs this deception that I may strike out at our enemies. She had said that, but she had also said that she would wake to accuse her murderer and call him to justice, and here she lay, in Galdar’s arms, as cold and pale as a cut lily frozen in the snow.
He was about to place that fragile lily on the top of a pile of wood that would blaze into a raging inferno with a single spark.
Mina’s Knights formed a guard of honor, marching behind Galdar in the funeral procession. They wore their armor, polished to a black sheen, and kept their visors lowered, each hiding his own grief behind a mask of steel. Unbidden by their commanders, the troops formed a double line leading from the tent to the bier. Soldiers who had followed her for weeks stood side by side with those who had just newly arrived but who had already come to adore her. Galdar walked slowly between the rows of soldiers, never pausing as their hands reached out to touch her chill flesh for one last blessing. Young soldiers wept unashamedly. Scarred and grizzled veterans looked grim and stern and brushed hastily at their eyes. Walking behind Galdar, Captain Samuval led Mina’s horse, Foxfire. As was customary, her boots were reversed in the stirrups. Foxfire was edgy and restless, perhaps due to the proximity of the minotaur—the two had formed a grudging alliance, but neither truly liked the other—or perhaps the raw emotions of the soldiers affected the animal, or perhaps the horse, too, felt Mina’s loss. Captain Samuval had his hands full controlling the beast, who snorted and shivered, bared his teeth, rolled his eyes until the whites showed, and made dangerous and unexpected lunges into the crowd.