announced that the queen would host a feast for all of her subjects, to be served on the great commons below the castle.
Word of the impending celebration spread rapidly, and when the queen and her elder daughter emerged from the castle in late afternoon, a cheering crowd shouted their devotion along the raised roadway that led down to the field.
'It
'There are memories of Father everywhere around here,' Alicia agreed. 'It always seemed that, when the family stayed at Corwell, he had more time for us-he
Robyn smiled, though the tears began to veil her eyes. 'He must have remembered his own father when we were here. He always vowed that he would show his children more affection than King Bryan showed to him.'
Alicia looked at the sea of faces spread across the fields below them. She had always enjoyed the attention awarded her rank, and never before had she beheld such a throng. Yet today the sensation was pale, even insignificant. 'How can we feel lonely when so many shout their affection for us?'
'Because we've lost the one we really desire to hear it from,' Robyn replied. Alicia saw, with surprise, that her mother's face had hardened. The queen smiled at her subjects, a frozen, formal expression, and the crowd fell in behind them as they approached the commons, already covered with cloths, tables, and benches for the feast.
'The Earl of Corwell has done a commendable job,' observed the princess, beholding an array of canopied tables and great firepits where several massive oxen rotated on huge spits.
'Lord Randolph has ever been an able administrator,' Robyn replied, fondly remembering the young captain to whom Tristan had entrusted his home realm when the High King and Queen first embarked for Callidyrr.
Now all the young Ffolk of the town, it seemed, had turned out to serve the meal, and swiftly the nobles and esteemed citizens were seated. The rest of the Ffolk would eat where they could. Keane, Tavish, Prince Brandon, Pawldo of Lowhill, and the Earl of Fairheight all joined Lord Randolph and the two noblewomen at the head table.
Crusty loaves of bread, hot from the oven, appeared on the tables before them. Wheels of cheese, mild and sharp and all ranges between, complemented the bread, and pitchers of wine and ale overflowed onto the tables. Cooks bustled about, trimming and slicing from the steers and pigs that now entered the final stage of the daylong cooking process.
'Does the lady bard have a song for the occasion?' inquired Robyn, smiling at Tavish.
'There's a tune I've been trying out,' the harpist allowed, her eyes twinkling with pleasure. She slung her lute from her shoulder with a casual flip. 'It's in the early stages, mind you. I've been planning to put some work into it when I can find the time.'
The others watched as she tuned a few recalcitrant strings and then strummed a bright chord. 'This is a song about Corwell-in the distant past,' Tavish explained as her fingers deftly walked across the strings. 'A time when there were as many elves as humans in the isles-more, perhaps. The first verses tell of the birth of the kingdom of Corwell.
'This part of Gwynneth was ruled by King Deric, a good man, brave and heroic. His people lived in peace with the Llewyrr, the elves of Moonshae. Still, the two didn't mix much.'
She started to sing the verse then, and her listeners saw the proud King Deric of the Ffolk, astride his white charger. The steed pranced on the beach as his piratical enemies fled from the scene of a disastrous battle. The warriors of Gwynneth had just defeated the greatest invasion ever to menace their shores. King Deric was victorious and triumphant, and he used his prestige to forge all the cantrevs of southern Gwynneth into the fledgling kingdom of Corwell.
The strains of the song floated across the field, compelling the attention of all who could hear. Time passed swiftly as the bard wove her tale.
Deric was a good king, and Corwell flourished beyond any other kingdom in the isles. He was a leader just and wise, decisive and merciful. Even the elves made peace with Deric of Corwell. This was in the age when the numbers of elves and humans on Gwynneth were roughly equal, thus the forging of the peace was no small accomplishment.
Many times Deric journeyed to the elven capital of Chrysalis, there to meet with Kaminas, monarch of the elves.
Yet as the years of Deric's adulthood began to pass, his people worried that he took no wife, left no heir. All the maidens-and a good many of the dames-in his kingdom sought his attention, but he paid them no heed. Unsavory rumors circulated, and the king's loyal companions slew many a gossiper in late-night tavern duels.
In fact, the king was in love, and his beloved would have granted a splendid heir to the kingdom, for her blood was royal, too, of a strain that had ruled for far longer than the clan of Corwell. Yet the match was unacceptable to both the Ffolk and her own people.
Deric's beloved was Herene, princess of Synnoria and daughter of Kaminas, the High Elven Lord.
The Synnorian ruler was appalled by his daughter's attraction to the human king. At first, he tried to coax her toward other beaus, but she showed no interest in even the most handsome elves among all the Llewyrr. Later King Kaminas resorted to sending Herene away from the valley when King Deric's visits were anticipated.
But the lovers found ways to circumvent these precautions as well. The man would arrive unannounced, or the princess would cut short her departure. Finally Kaminas faced a drastic action, but one he felt necessary to the survival of his kingdom: He closed Synnoria to humans, barring their presence there for any reason. The wizards and clerics among the Llewyrr, with the help of mighty Corellon Larethian, god of all elves, weaved a pattern of spells around Synnoria, blocking all its borders against human intrusion.
Though he tried many times throughout the remainder of his life, King Deric was never able to find a path into Synnoria. He never saw the elven princess again. Decades later, he died, childless, and a bitter civil war resulted in a series of brutal tyrants holding the throne and wresting it away from each other.
Herene lived for many centuries, and eventually her father compelled her to marriage, yet she, too, perished without an heir. And from that era to this, the bard concluded, the borders of Synnoria remained closed.
On that note, Tavish let the notes of her final chord fade.
The harpist lowered her instrument and caught her breath. Noticing her own hunger, Alicia finally realized that Tavish had been singing for a long time, though the minutes had seemed to pass with a trancelike beauty.
Now the meat was served, and quickly the guests' attention turned to the food. Pitchers were refilled, but the conversation faded away as men and women alike went to work on their plates.
'Where is the young Princess Deirdre?' Randolph inquired after a while, as they dined on beef and pork, with bowls of thick soup and still more loaves of bread before them. 'Will she attend the council?'
'She promised me that she would arrive by tomorrow,' the High Queen replied in clipped tones, 'though I encouraged her to attend the feast today.'
'I see.' The Earl of Corwell wisely refrained from further conversation on the topic.
'It's a delight to have the queen's presence at our meager Corwellian table,' said the rotund Pawldo, reaching for another rib of pork with both of his ring-bejeweled hands. Though he was a mere three feet tall, his appetite was the match of any of the humans'. The halfling had made his fortune as a merchant but was famed more as the courageous adventurer who had accompanied King Kendrick on his rise to the throne. Now the comforts of his wealth and station generally held him to the confines of Corwell Town or the neighboring halfling community of Lowhill.
'Your table is always sumptuous, and never more than now,' Robyn disagreed with a laugh.
'Will my lady princess be attending the dance?' inquired Hanrald, blushing furiously as he spoke to Alicia. Keane and Brandon leaned forward.
'I imagine so,' Alicia allowed, enjoying the attention as the three of them sought her pledges to dance. For a moment, she felt the light happiness she had known throughout her life, but then the memory of their purpose here came back with renewed poignancy, as if her father had perished only yesterday.
Festive Ffolk sat at tables all around them, gathered in knots of conversation. Harps and lutes, flutes and horns, rang across the broad field, while jugglers and magicians worked through the crowd, entertaining to exclamations of delight and disbelief. It was altogether a scene of considerable commotion.
Thus the party of strangers approached quite close to the head table before anyone there even took note of
