from in front, and she buried her face in his chest and sobbed with such force that his whole body shook. Her fingers were like claws, and Aunadar bent swiftly to murmur in her ear as his encircling arm went around her shoulders. “Lady mine, all is not lost. Whatever befalls this fair realm and your ever valiant father, my hand and heart are yours. I shall serve you with all I have, never failing nor leaving you in need-especially now, when your need is greatest. Now, as the wolves circle Cormyr, waiting and watching for your weakness. Be strong, Tanalasta, queen of my heart! Be strong, queen of the realm!”
His voice rose in passion, and Tanalasta raised bright, desperate eyes to him, tears racing down her cheeks, and reached up to him, murmuring his name through ragged sobs.
Had the king died? A woman sounded in real grief, just ahead. Dauneth almost thrust the hanging aside and strode out to offer what comfort he could, but the word “Queen” once and then again stopped him. The hanging suddenly seemed a friendly but all too flimsy shield. He’d wandered through more rooms than he could keep track of and hidden behind a lot of hangings to reach this place. Surely he must now be in the royal wing.
He looked down to be sure that he didn’t stumble and make noise. The floor was bare and clear. They even dust behind the hangings here! he thought with amazement. Then a sudden, chilly addendum struck him: When was the last time they had dusted? And would they dust again soon?
But the voices came again, and he heard the name “Tanalasta.” The crown princess! Turning to… a suitor, it seemed, for comfort. A gap in the hangings was just ahead, with aching care, Dauneth crept forward, keeping well back against the wall, and peered out.
A woman in a severe gown of the finest make knelt on a footstool with her head against the breast of a man whose arms were around her, his head bent over hers as he murmured comforting words. Dauneth knew him slightly, it was Aunadar, of the Bleth clan. All the talk he’d heard, then, was true. Above her head, Aunadar seemed almost to smile for a moment, and Dauneth looked hard at him.
No trace of the smile-if it had indeed been a smile and not a mere twitch of tired lips-came again, but the eyes of the man whose arms were around the princess were cold and somehow triumphant.
If I were deeply in love and feeling grief for my lover, would I look like that? Dauneth drew back, troubled, but not knowing what to say or do. His discovery, if anyone found him here, could very well mean his death. So he held still, hardly daring to breathe, and listened.
“If you weren’t here, Aunadar, I don’t know what I’d do…”
“Yet I am here, most royal lady, here… and your servant, forever, if you’ll grant it so! Let me be the strong shield at your back, the faithful hound who walks at your side in the shadows… and together we shall win through to bright mornings ahead!”
Dauneth winced. Where did the man find such words? The best-perfumed chapbooks of Sembian love poems?
“Oh, Aunadar, I must go to him! He may be stronger, and if he should wake again, I must be there!”
“Come then, Lady Highness!” Aunadar said grandly, throwing wide a door.
“Oh, Aunadar!” The crown princess said in loving adoration.
“Tana!” he replied, in a voice deep with passion. “My Tana!”
“Yes,” she breathed fervently, and they swept out shoulder to shoulder, fingers laced together.
Dauneth watched them go in thoughtful silence. There was definitely something amiss in this royal house, but he was too ignorant of the everyday feel of things here to put his finger on it. He had to talk to someone. Of course! Rhauligan! The merchant would know what to do now. Dauneth drew in a deep breath, squared his shoulders, and stepped boldly out into the open, as if he had every right to be there and was hurrying on his way, in the conduct of business crucial to the realm.
After all, wasn’t he?
“Glarasteer Rhauligan, sir, dealer in turret tops and spires, stone and wood both-you order ‘em, and we’ll build ‘em, fast and cheap an’ they won’t fall down!” the merchant introduced himself grandly as the newcomer tried to sit down next to him and Dauneth.
The newcomer peered at him suspiciously, snorted, and turned away from the table. “I was seeking someone else,” he said curtly over his shoulder, leaving the young man and the merchant in peace. Rhauligan gave him a cheery wave of farewell that somehow became an impolite gesture and then-as chuckles from other tables made the man whirl around again-a signal for more service.
A waitress with the longest, smoothest legs Dauneth had ever seen on a human drifted over. “My lord?”
“A flask of firedrake,” the merchant told her, “and two tallglasses-one for my friend here.”
The waitress started to turn, and Dauneth gave her a smile that bought him a frank and admiring one to match before she bustled away to see to warm firedrake wine and cold, salt-rimmed glasses.
“Well, lad?” Rhauligan asked in a low voice as the scion of House Marliir shifted to a more comfortable position in his chair.
Dauneth shot a dark look across the table. “No bodies falling out of doors or knife-wielding clusters of masked nobility,” he muttered, “but I did hear Aunadar Bleth comforting the crown princess.”
“And?”
“Something didn’t seem quite right,” Dauneth murmured. “He seemed just a little too happy about the king dying.”
Rhauligan shrugged. “And why not? If he’s Tanalasta’s favorite and she becomes queen, he can run Cormyr without any of the perils of ruling it. He wouldn’t be the first noble to be more in love with a woman’s position than with the lass herself, now, would he?”
“That’s true,” Dauneth agreed reluctantly and sat back with a sigh-in time to look up with a hasty smile as the waitress bent over him and set their drinks on the table, gave his shoulder a friendly squeeze, and was gone again. Despite himself, he turned his head to watch her go.
Rhauligan grinned, shook his head, and poured them both firedrake wine, watching the glasses steam and fog as the warmed liquid met chilled glass. Ah, to be young again…
“On me, lad,” he said as the young noble turned his head back to the table. Dauneth hadn’t even managed to open his mouth to protest that it was his turn, even past his turn, to pay for things, when the merchant asked, “Did anyone see you? Should I expect Purple Dragons to come in here hunting young Marliirs?”
Dauneth shook his head.
“Did you have to show your scroll to anyone?”
Dauneth shook his head again, then frowned, set down his glass, and reached into the open front of his shirt, and fumbled with the wooden toggle that held his safe pouch closed. When he drew it forth, the scroll was only a little crumpled at one end. He stared at it curiously, turning it a little in his fingers. “I wonder what it says,” he said slowly under his breath.
“So open it,” the merchant urged, sipping warm wine.
“Oh, but Emthrara-” he started to protest.
“Gave it to you to let every hairy-nosed guard who might ask your business have a read,” the merchant put in. “So…?”
Dauneth looked at him doubtfully for a moment, and then, as if of their own accord, his fingers went to the ribbon that bound it, slid it along without untying Emthrara’s knot, and let the parchment loosen of itself. Then, in sudden impatience at himself, the young noble spread the scroll out on a dry area of tabletop and read it.
There were only a few lines, in a fine, flowing hand:
“The bearer of this note is Dauneth Marliir, of noble blood and on a mission of the greatest importance to the crown. If he would see Cormyr’s future as bright as winter stars above the Stonelands, he will meet the azure- masked one in the Snout Room of the Roving Dragon at the lighting of the evening candles. Let him pass, in the name of Alusair.” Underneath that was a little mark, or personal rune, that looked like a three-petaled red flower, or perhaps a stylized crown.
Dauneth looked up at Rhauligan. “Here! Read!” He thrust the parchment across the table. The merchant read it, let his brows rise for a moment and then fall again, rolled it up carefully, replaced its ribbon, then handed it back. “Well, now, that’s handy, lad… ‘twon’t be all that long now till they light ‘em.”
The young noble sputtered. “Yes, but-but Emthrara gave me this! How did she know I’d be here? And now?” His eyes narrowed. “You told her!”
“By the gods, lad,” the merchant protested, “you’re beginning to see conspiracies behind every pillar in Suzail! Drink up and think awhile, things always go better when your thoughts go ahead of your tongue… if you take
