Not so foolish and stubborn as we thought, if they were waiting for something Mauryl promised them—and now has delivered.”
“Then why send a Sihhé revenant to me, crow? Your logic escapes me.”
“Mistakes are possible. Mauryl dead—perhaps the Shaping went down the wrong road. Or perhaps he did not. Who knows but Mauryl?
And perhaps Uleman.”
“Then Uleman’s logic escapes me. Why this proposal to me?”
“Why, because Mauryl had not yet fulfilled his promise. Or if he had, Uleman had no idea of it. He sees his kingdom foundering for want of an heir—and, my lord Prince, if he had such, he needs no marriage with his longstanding enemy. I’m certain he desires no Marhanen in his daughter’s bed. But Uleman is an honest and doting man, as I hear, fond of his wife, fond of his daughter, with his lords chafing at the bit, wanting more than a Regency for some King to Come. Each of his earls seeing, as mortality comes on the third and sonless Regent, that marriage with this—we dare not call her princess, only the Regent’s daughter—would legitimize any of them as an Elwynim King.
This is what they see. And—if one believes in wizardly foresight—dare we believe that the third generation is the charm, that old Mauryl laid a sonlessness on the Elwynim Regent so that it would come down to this, just at the time Mauryl should produce a claimant and fulfill his magical promise.”
“Gods, I should have you my architect, not the Lord Commander of my guard. Such a structure of conjecture and hypothesis! Shall we put towers on ’t?”
“And shall we not think that this Shaping of Mauryl’s is a rival for your father’s power? That he is the bridegroom for this bride? That Uleman will know this, the moment he knows this Shaping exists? Send now to Uleman accepting his offer and see whether he sends the bride. I think he would see her wed a dead Sihhé king rather than a live Marhanen.”
Cefwyn drew deliberately slow breaths and leaned his chin on his hand, elbow on the arm of the chair, listening, simply listening, and thinking that, whatever else, Mauryl’s childlike Shaping had least of all the knowledge what to do with a bride, Elwynim or otherwise.
But—but—Tristen had had no knowledge of horses, either, until he climbed into red Gery’s saddle. Tristen rode—a prince could be magnanimous toward such skill—far better than he did, on far less horse. That stung, more, actually, than any prospective rivalry for the Elwynim Regent’s daughter, who was, as an ivory portrait, a matter of mere theoretical and aesthetic interest- But interest enough to risk a taint of Sihhé blood in the Marhanen line—no. The Quinalt would not accept it. The Quinalt would rise up against the Crown.
“It may be true,” Idrys said, “that Mauryl robbed this Shaping of his wits. But Mauryl gave him a book which I concede may not be Mauryl’s household accounts. This Shaping is, however you reckon his worth, not the feckless boy that came here.”
“Oh, come, would you set Tristen to guard the larder from the kitchen boys? Far less set him to govern a kingdom! And now you fear wizardly curses and prophecies? You were never so credulous as that before.”
“My lord Prince,” Idrys said broadly, “I did not believe in such things.
I did not believe that the Mauryl Gestaurien who betrayed Elfwyn was that Mauryl who betrayed Galasien after very similar fashion. Now I do take it so.”
“On what evidence?”
“Good gods, m’lord, we talk and sit at table with a Shaping, in broad daylight and by dark. What is more probable? That Mauryl is the same Mauryl—or that you have invited a dead man to your table tonight?”
“It is a question,” he conceded.
“And if Mauryl has robbed him of his wits, still this Tristen is not the young man that came here. That compliant boy is gone, my lord Prince.
Look at him carefully tonight. You were far safer dining with Heryn at Heryn’s table. At least you never believed Heryn to the exclusion of your own advisers. If I were a credulous man—and I am fast becoming a believer in more than ever I did—I would say you were bewitched.”
“I and the Elwynim Regent. —So what profits us to wriggle? We are foredoomed, we cannot stray from our wizard-set actions. I do not believe that, Idrys! And I have seen a portrait of Elfwyn, likewise in ivory—my father had it from Grandfather and keeps it in a chest with other curiosities of Althalen’s unspendable treasures. I see nothing like our guest in that face, as I recall it. So what is a Shaping? If the Summoned soul’s the same, then why not the flesh that clothes it?”
“Because the flesh is gone to worms, my lord, and whether a Shaping need resemble the dead it clothes I leave to wizards. But should the soul not have something to do with Shaping the flesh about it, all the same? I should much doubt he was a Sihhé princess. A king, well he could be.
The King the Elwynim believe will come again. Go, go, accept the Elwynim marriage. I’ll warrant no bride comes across the river.”
“Then why should Mauryl not send him to the Elwynim? And how could a wizard who could raise the sleeping dead so broadly miss his target?”
“Perhaps he didn’t miss.”
“How not?”
“To wreak most havoc, my lord Prince. I’ll warrant worse than happened at Emwy comes by spring, and I’ll warrant bridges are building at least by spring thaw, if not by now, else I would have counseled you more emphatically than I do not to call the border lords in. Let your father the King take this move of yours for foresight—and so it is. But foresight against only one of your enemies, m’lord Prince. The worst one of all you lodge next your own bedchamber. The King who should come again, my lord. Well that you’ve called Emuin.”
“Emuin was Mauryl’s student.” He wished not to listen to Idrys’ fancies. But once the thoughts were sailing through his mind, they spread more canvas. “And dare I trust Emuin, if this was all along the design?
Whom shall I trust, master crow? You, the arbiter of all my affections?”
“Few,” Idrys said. “Trust few, m’lord Prince. And only such as you can watch. You say very true: Emuin was Mauryl’s student.”
“Leave me. I’ve thoughts to think without your voice in my ear.”
Idrys rose, bowed, walked toward the door. Anger was in Cefwyn’s mind. Petty revenge sprang to his lips ... harsh belittlement of Idrys’ fears. But Idrys had never deserved it.
He let Idrys go in silence to the anteroom that was his home, his narrow space between the doors. Sword by his side, Idrys slept, every night ready to defend his own life and the heir’s should the outside guards fail or fall in their duty. Little wonder Idrys’ every thought was deception and doubt.
He had sent for Emuin and had now to wait, first for the message to reach his old tutor, and then for Emuin to gather his aged bones onto a horse and ride back. He was not certain now whether he wholly welcomed Emuin’s intrusion into the matter. He needed time for all that
Idrys had told him to sink into bone and nerve. He needed time to know in his own heart what he had taken under his roof, or what manner of situation he had made for himself.
Win his love, Emuin had said. Win his love.
Gods, how much had Emuin known, or guessed, or foreseen about Mauryl’s work? He had questions to ask. He had very many of them.
And it was still, all things considered, a good thing to have sent to Emuin. But more than trusting Emuin to solve matters—he had to solve them in some way that preserved the peace on the border, if in fact Mauryl had aimed at overthrowing the present order.
Wizards and spells. Like Uwen, he had been disposed to believe the accounts of magic as exaggerated, the wizard arts as no more than he was already accustomed to see in Emuin’s warnings and in the likes of the woman at Emwy—a great deal of show, taking advantage of a fortuitous gust, claiming credit for natural events and natural misfortunes.