Gods, he hated cases like this one.
He found himself at that window again, where on a happier day he had looked down on his two sons at practice. The yard was deep in snow, now, and desolate. Aewyn moped about, attending his studies, and having pinned a large map of Amefel above his study desk. Aewyn had stopped his rebellion, finally, and admitted his new tutor was a decent fellow, and that learning history was a good thing. Aewyn had even, by way of apology, he supposed, given him a very nice copy of the Rules of Courtly Order, written in a young hand that had begun to have clerkly flourishes perhaps unbecoming in a future king.
It was such a sad compliance, where there had been such joyous skirting of the rules…
He looked down at snow-covered stones, and measured the depth by the degree to which the rosebush in the corner was buried: only its pruned top and heap of mulch was above the snow, which seemed at its thinnest, there. A great icicle hung down from the eave, and several predecessors had crashed below, in the cyclic warming and chill of previous days.
His breath made a fog on the window, a veil between him and the courtyard. And suddenly his vision centered on a disturbance in that fogged glass. A word appeared.
Come, it said. Just that. Come.
Chilling as the first warning, to caution… and what dared he do?
He wanted to rush downstairs on the next breath, call for his horse, and ride, unprepared and unheralded, but a king had obligations… his person to protect, for the kingdom’s sake; documents to sign, matters which had been most carefully negotiated; the fate of two children to decide, that case on which important things rested… not least Efanor’s question of the Quinaltine…
He looked twice more at the window glass, to be absolutely sure, before he wiped it out with his sleeve and left no record.
Tristen had his other son in hand. Tristen wanted him to come to Ynefel. That was what. But it wouldn’t be a matter of his son’s life and death, not with Tristen protecting him. So the urgency was a little less.
He labored through the next few hours, wishing he knew exactly what to do with the Quinaltine, knowing that a priestly fuss was bound to break out in all its fury, with Ninévrisë here with Efanor, and Ninévrisë the higher authority, a Bryaltine, an Elwynim, and the target of all discontent: that worried him most. She was due, when snowmelt came, to take Aemaryen to Elwynor, the baby to be presented to the Elwynim as their heir to the Regency, their Princess, the fulfillment of the Marhanen promise to that kingdom; and she could not delay that journey for her own people, even if she became embroiled in priestly politics on this side of the Lenúalim.
Best she go, now, ahead of time, rather than late: best Efanor sit in power over the priests without the controversy of an Elwynim queen. Efanor knew how to argue with the Holy Father: gifted with the power of the king’s commission, and his alliances as duke of Guelessar, he could make progress with the Holy Father, if the Holy Father had no one else with whom to politic.
He had to get Ninévrisë and her ladies on the road early, that was what.
Then he could go to Amefel and from there on to Ynefel, where he ached to be, at least for the season. The prospect was beyond attractive.
“A little snow never can daunt me,” was Ninévrisë’s answer when he told her his intent. “But why so sudden?”
“Tristen Sent,” he said. To her, he could tell the entire truth. “He has Otter in keeping. He wants me. And I have to go.”
“Aewyn will go into mourning if you don’t take him with you,” Ninévrisë said, and that was the truth. He had thought of sending Aewyn with her, but it was very much the truth… and very much better politics among Guelenfolk not to have his son and heir in Elwynor while his wife, the Regent of Elwynor, was presenting his sister to the Elwynim as their own treaty-promised possession.
“He could meet Tristen,” Ninévrisë said. “I should ever so much wish to go, myself… but the treaty—they expect us this spring.”
“I know.” They stood at the same window, which now had one smeared pane, and he took her in his arms and kissed her. He loved this woman. He loved her for her steady calm and her lightning wit; and now for finding a clear, smooth way to do in an organized way what had seemed so impossibly difficult before he broke the news to her. Of course she would go. Of course a winter trip would be a strenuous adventure, but this was a woman who’d ridden to war, managed a soldiers’ camp, and could wield a weapon without a qualm. A little snow didn’t daunt her, indeed, not even with an infant in arms.
“I love you,” he said.
“Flattery, flattery. You’ll leave Efanor to manage things?”
“He can do everything I would do. More, with the priests: he knows all their secrets. Only you stay safe.”
“You keep an eye on our son,” Ninévrisë said, straight to the heart of the matter, a warning with a mother’s understanding of their son’s habits and the possibilities in the venture.
“He is growing up,” he said, to reassure her. “He made me a copy of the Courtly Order, do you know? It looked like a clerk’s hand. He mopes, grievously. He reads, this winter. He hasn’t stolen a horse or run off to Amefel. It’s the other boy who did that.”
“What he did whenOtter was here—No, no, I don’t blame Otter at all. He’s a wild creature. He always will be, I fear, and no ill against him. Our son, on the other hand, needsto read and mope a bit. Kings have to do that.”
He rested his head against hers. It was a comfortable place to be. “Perhaps this one needs to do a little less of it. His penmanship is too good. I ache to be out there, Nevris. I ache to be in Ynefel.”
“And I, to tell the truth. I ache to be on the road, snow and all. We’ll have to conspire, and appoint a tryst.”
“Where?”
“In Henas’amef, at first bloom?”
His head came up. He looked at her. “That’s a long time for us to be away from court.”
“Time enough for Efanor to be thoroughly weary of petitions. Time enough for the Holy Father to know he can’t bluff Efanor.” Her fingers ran, warm and soft, over his brow, and a smile quirked her lips. “You’ve gotten a little worry line, love. Shed it before it sets. It doesn’t become you.”
He kissed the fingers in question. “In Henas’amef,” he said. “We’ll ride home together from there, at first bloom.”
“Crocuses in the muddy fields,” she said, “and standing puddles to drown a pony in. I love Amefel in the springtime.”