The words that burnt to black cinders all Antony’s victories, and all his hopes for the future.
“It is his Majesty’s pleasure,” the Lord Keeper said, his words echoing from the walls of the chamber, where less than a month before they had conducted the opening ceremonies, “that this Parliament be dissolved; and he giveth license to all knights, citizens, and burgesses to depart at their pleasure. And so, God save the King!”
THE ONYX HALL, LONDON: May 5, 1640
Lune tapped her fan against the arm of her chair in time to the beat of the allemande, watching the fae of her court swirl past in their finery. The music this time came from an entire consort of mortals, which rumor said had been snatched from one of the fine houses along the Strand, where some peer or other had contracted them for his own amusement.
But the musicians did not look unhappy to be here, and so she let the matter pass. So long as no one was mistreated, the occasional temporary theft did not bother her. They would be returned no worse for the wear, and in time might even come to frequent this court. That would please her immensely.
Which her courtiers knew. She was therefore not surprised to see the black head of Sir Cerenel coming her way, with a man in tow behind him. The stranger, a human in ragged clothing, gaped open-mouthed at everything around him, devoting his attention impartially to goblins and shoes, her ivory chair and the sharply arched ceiling of the hall in which the fae danced. Cerenel had him firmly but not unkindly in hand, and with gentle pressure convinced the man to kneel with him before Lune.
“Your Majesty,” the knight said, “I beg your indulgence to bring a guest to this occasion.”
In Antony’s absence, Lune glanced around and gestured for Benjamin Hipley to approach. “Who is he?”
Cerenel glanced sideways at the unwashed stranger, then up at her. “I found him in London, madam, where I had gone to call upon a lady. Though I was well masked in a glamour, and protected against its failure, this fellow saw my true face through that concealment.”
“A lunatic,” she said, straightening in her chair. No one had brought such a mortal below for quite some time, though they used to be fashionable. “Escaped from Bedlam?”
“More likely he was permitted to leave,” Hipley said, when she looked to him for clarification. With her permission he approached the man, who flinched back, but did not run. “The violent ones are chained, and not likely to escape. Did he have a small bowl?” That last was directed to Cerenel, who nodded. “Licensed to beg, then.”
He did not look happy at the madman’s presence in the Onyx Hall, but whether it was because of the stranger’s mean status, or Cerenel’s notion of entertainment, Lune could not say. She herself was not fond of lunatics; she remembered too well how this court had once abused them. But this one would not be mistreated now—and it might be useful to welcome him. Let her subjects see that she favored those who dealt kindly with the mad. “Has he a name?” she asked.
“None I can get from him,” Cerenel said. She believed him, too. He had not always been concerned with mortals as people, but he was one of Lune’s better converts; over the years since her accession, Cerenel had come more or less to share her way of thinking. Not quite with such fervency, but she counted it a victory.
The allemande had drawn to a close, the musicians playing out their final measures long after most of the dancers had ceased to move. Courtiers jostled for position, trying to see the stranger.
“He is welcome among us,” Lune declared, loud enough for all to hear. “As an honored guest. Food and wine for him, from Lord Antony’s store.” Addressing the madman, she said, “Be of good cheer. Tonight, you need not beg for your supper.”
She did not need to tell Hipley to watch after the man. Nor, she was glad to see, did he do so alone; while several ladies flirted with Cerenel, feeding on the minor status he had just won, Lady Amadea devoted her attentions to the lunatic, keeping him safe from the more predatory of courtiers. As for the madman, he gorged happily enough on the sweetmeats and candied fruit brought for him, though he watched the room through skittish eyes.
Her supervision was interrupted when the usher at the door announced the Prince of the Stone. Everyone paused in their places, bowing to Antony as he entered, but no one approached him; the black look on his face forbade it.
He came straight for Lune and spoke before she could even ask what was wrong. “He has dissolved Parliament.”
It struck like a blow, less for her own disappointment and frustration than his. Antony had struggled so hard to achieve this, and now it was taken from him, after a few short, wasted weeks. “We passed acts concerning the pointing of needles,” he said through his teeth, “while Pym and his men forced us toward business they knew would alienate the King. Indeed, they wished it! The Puritans among them have no desire to see the Covenanters suppressed.”
The notion that they would deliberately undermine the King was disturbing. “That,” Lune said, “is just shy of treason.”
“Or past it.” Antony dropped without looking into the chair a hobthrush hurried to place behind him, and glared away the fae who were unabashedly eavesdropping.
Lune recognized the bleak hardness in his eyes. It had grown over the years she’d known him, from his first arrival in this court as a young man with scarcely enough whiskers to call a beard. She made him her consort because she needed his stubborn loyalty to the mortal world; he accepted because he dreamed of changing that world for the better, with faerie aid. But he was a single man, whatever aid he had, and all too often his efforts ended in failure.
It saddened her to see him thus, growing older and grimmer, year by year. How old was he now? How much longer would he last?
I will lose him some day. As I lost the man before him.
She smiled, a practiced mask to conceal the inevitable grief. “There will be another opportunity,” she said. “Charles is not the ruler his father was; he has no skill at playing factions off one another. I have no doubt that circumstances will force him to convene Parliament again.”
“But how long will that take?” Antony muttered, and lapsed into silence.
She left him to it, recognizing the need to let a mood pass. Her own subdued spirits demanded distraction, not contemplation. After the next dance was done, she left the dais and went to join an energetic courante, her slippers flickering along the marble floor. All around her was a mass of paned sleeves and flying curls, courtiers moving flawlessly through the quick, running steps of the dance. For a few moments, she was able to lay her thoughts aside.
Until a chill sharper than winter’s breath gripped her bones.
Without warning, the dancers faltered. They staggered against one another, weak and nauseous, and Lune’s foot caught the hem of her skirts; she stumbled and almost fell.
Pain stabbed through her shoulder, locking her entire body in paralysis, so she could not even cry out.
A roar came from behind her, and then the transfixing spike ripped free, leaving her to crumple in a boneless heap to the floor. Rolling, weeping in agony and shock, Lune saw her attacker.
He, too, was on the floor, pinned under the weight of the elf-knight who had thrown him down. The madman laughed in unintelligible triumph even as the knight smashed his hand against the marble, shattering bones and knocking free his bloodstained iron knife.
And then the laughter stopped, lost in a wet gurgle when the knight plunged his own dagger through the mortal’s throat.