"I'm to understand, then, that you are a decent provincial war-lord, and fairly well read."
"Exactly." Sam's back was hurting. He got up from the stool and walked over to the north window. The window's glass was very fine, some of the clearest he'd seen, each square pane bright as a mirror. The Kingdom people did wonders with glass…
"Well, milord – Sir Monroe – you are trying to persuade the wrong person. I am not the Queen. Put it another way: I can say no. I'm not interested in marriage; certainly not with you."
Sam saw gulls spiraling down past the tower. It was the view the Boston girl would have had, Walking-in-air. He was struck by what a strange people those New Englanders must be, to have – at least a few of them – such a gift, and treat it only as utility… Beneath the gulls, the river Mississippi lay many miles wide, its current, beaten silver, reflecting the mid-day's winter sun like the oval yolk of the Rain-bird's egg.
"You misunderstand me." Sam turned back from wonderful airiness to the chamber's circling stone space. "I wasn't trying to persuade you, Princess. I was explaining the necessity. You cannot say no."
"I think I can." Princess Rachel stood up behind her desk – was certainly a little taller – and started to the door. "And you are leaving."
"Don't… do that." Sam stayed where he was, saw her hesitate. "If you call your guards in, my sergeant and I might have to kill them. It would be a bad beginning."
The Princess stood still.
" – A lesson, Princess. Power lies along the edge of the nearest blade, and the best. If it were not for the Queen's rule, my sergeant and I could kill your two guards. Then I might beat you – bend you over that desk, rape you, force you to marriage. I've known men who would do it. I've seen men at this court who would do it." Sam reached over his right shoulder, slid the long sword's blade a few inches up out of its scabbard… then slid it back. "You see, Rachel, this solar is no sanctuary at all, and never has been. Your safety has rested – since your father's death – in the hands of a tired lady, now growing old. A lady who goes to bed with fear and deep decisions every night of her life, so that you, and others like you, do not have to."
"My mother – "
"Rachel, the Queen has said I might try to persuade you. And when a Queen says 'try' – as when I say 'try' – what is meant is, get it done."
"You lie! She wouldn't do that."
"I'm sure she wouldn't, ordinarily. She'd wish you married into one of the great River families, I suppose, since you seem not up to ruling more than book-shelves. But you might say Toghrul Khan has been our marriage-broker, Rachel. The arranger of our engagement at least, from the time your mother received pigeons confirming that Seventh and Eighth tumans had taken your West-bank army's garrison at Map-Jefferson City, and killed them all. – How many was it? Three thousand… four thousand men? And, of course, the women and children."
A silent Princess then, standing still as if savage dogs surrounded her, the blue dots on her cheekbones like spattered ink.
" – Which also was the reason she wasn't as angry as she might have been, hearing that my army had come up into Map-Louisiana."
"My mother doesn't confide her reasons to me."
"No. Why should she, Rachel?" Sam walked to the west window. That view was of Island's stone keeps, then the river. The coast of Map-Louisiana too far away to be seen. "Why should she? You're no part of her ruling." He turned back to the room. "She's a woman bearing responsibility for many hundreds of thousands of lives, in a kingdom still occasionally cannibal. And now, the Khan, a very great and merciless commander, is coming to your river."
"She never asks me for help!"
"Should she have to?"
"You heard her. I wasn't 'here' – only 'present.' "
"And was she right, or wrong? You allowed yourself to be only 'present,' walked away and came up here to your tower, where – it seems to me – you use books as walls, instead of ladders."
Definitely her father's daughter. Anger took her like a man, made her silent and still, except for her eyes. "You do not know me. And you do not know my mother."
"As women? No. But as present and future rulers, Rachel, I know you both very well, being one of those odd creatures myself. A creature whose army the Kingdom needs, a creature who might make a son-in-law who will not murder the Queen for the throne," – Sam smiled – "even with what is bound to be great provocation. A son-in-law also capable of dealing with the river lords, the Kingdom's East and West-bank armies, and the Fleet."
"And you – of course – are capable of all that."
"No, not without you. Without you, without an engagement to marry you, Rachel, I remain only the provincial war-lord you named me, and unable to unite the Kingdom's armies with mine. Unable to command them."
"I will not do it." The Princess walked back to her desk, and sat, seeming less secure behind her paperwork walls. "Now, you've said what you have to say. Please leave me."
"Rachel, your people and mine need my sword." Sam smiled at her, hoped she saw kindness in it. "And, sadly, where my sword goes… so do I."
"I would be no help in any of that." Perhaps there were tears in her eyes. "I'm happiest with copybooks. I enjoy… quiet." She tried a small smile. "I am not like my mother."
Sam glanced out the south window for the gull, and saw several a bow-shot away, riding cold wind. "I understand. You would be happy in some peaceful house. Perhaps with a peaceful man, but certainly with as many copybooks as could be gathered or lent from here or there… and visitors whose interests reached beyond present wars, present politics. You'd wish to correspond with others of like mind from Boston to the Pacific Coast – not all Kipchaks, I understand, gallop and shoot arrows – and from Mexico City, as well. Perhaps learn the Beautiful Language…"
"Yes. That's very much what I'd like."
"Then let me tell you, Rachel, what I'd like… There's a farm in the hills past Villa Ocampo. It's a place – we measure in Warm-time acres – a farm of about six hundred acres. A sheep farm, with more summer grazing higher in the hills. And there's hunting. Partridge and deer, of course. Brown bear… wolves. There's a fieldstone house on the place, with a little wall around it, and a garden and orchard. We have just enough summer, most years, for crab apples."
The Princess listened and watched him, as a wary young mare might watch from spring pasture. Ready to wheel and run.
" – A man named Patterson owns the farm I'm speaking of. Important sheep-runner, Albert Patterson. And I believe he'd sell the place to me. There's no guarantee, of course – we hold a citizen's property as part of lawful liberty – but I believe he might sell, if I met his price." Sam smiled at her. "That is what I'd like, and like to do."
"Milord – "
"So now, Rachel, we know what we'd wish our lives to be. But, since neither of us is a fool, I think we also know the lives we will have."
"Your obligations are yours only."
"Yes – as yours will be to continue the decency of your mother's rule here! Decent, at least, compared to what it had been, with men eating men for dinner, and the river lords seizing anything they couldn't eat."