“What in the world?” Urbino demanded. He looked questioningly at Jemilla, but she could only frown and shake her head. No doing of hers.
The assembly listened in absolute silence. It sounded like a regular bombardment.
“My God, it’s the Knights Militant—they’ve come back,” some idiot gushed.
“Shut up!” another snapped.
They listened on. Urbino stood as still as a statue, his head cocked to the sound of the guns. They were very close by—they must have been firing from the battlements of the palace. But why? And then Jemilla realised, with a sickening plunge of spirit. It was a salute.
“Count the guns!” she cried, heedless of the shrill crack in her voice.
“That’s nineteen now,” one of the older nobles asserted. Hardio of Pontifidad, she remembered. A royalist. His face was torn between hope and dismay.
The echoing rumble of the explosions at last died away, but the crowds were still cheering manically. Twenty-eight guns. The salute for a reigning king. What in the world was going on?
“Maybe it’s for the new regent,” someone said, but Hardio shook his head.
“That’d be twenty-two guns.”
“Perhaps he’s dead,” one of the dullards suggested. “They always fire a salute on the death of a king.”
“God forbid,” Hardio rasped, but most of the men present looked relieved. It was Jemilla who spoke, her voice a lash of scorn.
“Don’t be a fool. You hear the crowds? You think they’d be cheering the death of the King?” It was slipping away—she could feel it. Somehow Golophin and Isolla had stymied her. But how?
The question was soon answered. There was a deafening blare of horns outside and the clatter of many horses. A Royal fanfare was blown over and over. Beyond the great double doors of the refectory they could hear the tramp of feet marching in step. Then a sonorous boom as someone struck the doors from the outside.
“Open in the name of the King!”
A group of timorous retainers belonging to Urbino’s household stood there, unsure. They looked to their lord for orders but he seemed lost in shock. It was Jemilla who rapped out, “Open the damn doors then!”
They did so. Those inside the hall stood up as one, scraping back their chairs on the old stone. Beyond the doors were two long files of Hebrian arquebusiers dressed in the rich blue of Royal livery. Banner-bearers stood with the Hibrusid gonfalons a silk shimmer above their heads. And at the head of them all, a tall figure in black half-armour, his face hidden by a closed helm upon which the Hebrian crown gleamed in a spangle of gems and gold.
Wordlessly, the files of arquebusiers entered the room and lined the walls. Their match was lit and soon filled the chamber with the acrid reek of gunpowder. The solitary figure in the closed helm entered last, the banner-bearers closing the doors behind him. The assembled nobles stood as though turned to stone, until a hard voice snapped, “Kneel before your King.”
And the figure in black unhelmed.
The aristocracy of Hebrion stared, gaped, and then did as they were bidden. The figure in the black armour was without a doubt Abeleyn IV, King of Hebrion and Imerdon.
He was taller than they remembered, and he looked old enough to be the father of the young man they had once known. No trace of the boy-king remained. His eyes were like two glitters of black frost as he surveyed the kneeling throng. Jemilla remained in her seat by the fire, too paralysed to move, but he did not even glance at her. The chamber stank of fear as much as the burning match. He could have them all shot, here and now, and no-one would be able to lift a finger.
Hardio and a few others who had been against the regency from the first were beaming. “Give you joy of your recovery, sire,” the old nobleman said. “This is a glad day for the kingdom.”
The severity on the seamed face of the King lifted somewhat: they glimpsed the youth of a few months past. “My thanks, Hardio. Noble cousins, you may rise.”
A collective sigh, lost in the noise of the aristocrats getting off their knees. They were to live, then.
“Now,” the King went on quietly, “I believe you were gathered here to discuss matters of import that concern my realm.” No-one missed the easy emphasis on the
“We will—if you do not object—take our place at the head of this august gathering.”
“By—by all means, sire,” Urbino stammered. “And may I also congratulate you on the regaining of your health and faculties.”
Abeleyn took the empty throne which headed the long table. His gait was odd: he walked on legs which seemed too long for him, rolling slightly like a sailor on the deck of a pitching ship.
“I was not aware our faculties had ever been lost, Urbino,” he said, and the coldness in his voice chilled the room. The nobles were once again aware of the lines of armed soldiers at their backs.
“But your concern is noted,” the King continued. “It shall not be forgotten.” And here Abeleyn’s eyes swept the room, coming to rest at last on Jemilla.
“We trust we see you well, lady.”
It took a second for her to find her voice. “Very well, my lord.”
“Excellent. But you should not be worrying yourself with the problems of state in your condition. You have our leave to go.”
There was no choice for her, of course. She curtsied clumsily, and then left the room. The doors boomed behind her, shutting her away from her ambitions and dreams. Jemilla kept her chin tilted high, oblivious to the roaring jubilation of the crowds outside, the grinning soldiers. Not until she had reached the privacy of her own apartments did she let the tears and the fury run unchecked.
“A very satisfactory state of affairs,” Himerius, High Pontiff of the Ramusian Kingdoms of the West, said.
It was a day of brilliant sunshine which blazed off the snow-covered Narian Hills all around and glittered in blinding facets upon the peaks of the Cimbric Mountains to the east. Himerius stood foursquare against the bitter wind which billowed down from those grim heights, and when he exhaled his breath was a white smoke shredded instantly away. Behind him, a group of monks in Inceptine black huddled within their habits and discreetly rubbed their hands together within voluminous sleeves in a futile effort to keep the blood in their fingers warm.
“Indeed, your Holiness,” bluff, florid-cheeked Betanza said. “It could not have gone more smoothly. As we speak, Regent Marat is preparing an expeditionary force of some eight thousand men. They should be here in fifteen days, if the weather holds.”
“The couriers have gone out to Alstadt?”
“They went yesterday, under escort of a column of Knights. I would estimate that within three months we will have a fortified garrison in the Torrin Gap, ready to repel any Merduk reconnaissance or to serve as a stageing post for further endeavours.”
“And what news from Vol Ephrir?”
“King Cadamost will accept a garrison on the Astaran border, but it must not be of Almarkan nationals. Knights Militant only—it is a question of national pride, you understand. Unfortunately, we do not currently have any Knights to spare.”
“Almarkan troops are now the servants of the Church as much as the Knights Militant. If it will ease Perigraine’s conscience the Almarkans can be clad in the livery of the Knights, but we must install our troops in southern Perigraine. Is that clear, Betanza?”
“Perfectly, Holiness. I shall see to it at once.”
“Cadamost shall be made an honourary presbyter, of course. It is the least I can do. He is a faithful son of the Church, truly. But he cannot afford to think of Perigraine alone at a time like this. We must present a united front against the heretics. If Skarp-Hethin of Finnmark is willing to accept Almarkan garrisons, then Cadamost has no reason not to do likewise.”
“Yes of course, your Holiness. It is merely a question of prestige. Skarp-Hethin is a prince, and his principality has traditionally been closely allied with Almark. But Perigraine is a sovereign state. Some of the diplomatic niceties must be observed.”
“Yes, yes. I am not a child, Betanza. Just get it done. I care not what hoops you have to jump through, but
