While Thelgaard is so very poor.”
“What about Solanthus? You haven’t said very much about him so far. Does he drink a lot, too?” Selinda wondered.
“The Duke of Solanthus,” the duchess began, enunciating her words with great care, “is a scoundrel and a cad. It is whispered”-her voice dropped to a breathy whisper-“that he might even be a murderer!”
“No!” gasped Selinda. She took a small sip of her own wine. It was a southern vintage, sweeter and little more fruity than she was used to. Although she liked it very much, she made sure to drink less than her hostess. “Tell me, who is he supposed to have killed?”
“Well, the duchess, his wife-his young wife-was once married to a lord, subject of the duke himself. That lord perished mysteriously on a hunt in the foothills of the Garnet Mountains, a hunt where it just so happens that the duke himself was leading the riders. Of course, the duke made a great display of grief and spoke high honors about the dead man. Very convincing. Less than a year later, he took the beautiful widow as his wife.”
“I should think the scandal would have cost him dearly,” Selinda remarked disapprovingly.
“Well, you don’t know Solanthus,” Martha declared. “He took over there two years after the War of Souls. He’s about as rich as the Lord Regent himself-oh, excuse me. Your papa, I mean. But Rathskell has made sure that, if you don’t like the way he is doing things, you don’t stay around.”
“You mean, he has killed other people?”
Martha shook her head. “No, but they find reason to leave. Many of ’em left, the ones who didn’t approve of his rule. Lord Lorimar was their leader-good man, Lord Lorimar,” she noted sadly.
“Yes. I always admired the way he rode horseback through the streets, not like the other lords in their fancy carriages and buggies. He was very handsome, dignified. He looked you right in the eyes when he talked to you. His daughter Dara and I were friends-though she was a little older than me. Such a terrible tragedy, their deaths. And the assassin still at large!”
“That assassin-oh, he’s slippery as a ghost,” Martha said. “Everybody looks and looks for him. He hasn’t been heard of for a time now. It’s as though he’s disappeared from the world!”
Selinda suppressed a shudder. Dara Lorimar had been a good-hearted, vivacious young woman. When the news of her and her father’s death had reached Palanthas, the lord regent had been enraged that one of his most loyal lords had been cruelly slain. Selinda had grieved over the death of a friend.
“My father has offered a thousand steel crowns as reward!” the princess murmured.
“Whoever brings him to justice will earn their reward,” Martha said, clearly a little bleary from the wine. “He’s a bad one.”
“My dear,” the duke said sternly. He had risen, unnoticed, from his seat and was now leaning over his wife’s shoulder. “I need you to come with me.”
“Oh,” Martha replied. She blinked her watery eyes. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said to the princess, before rising unsteadily.
“Surely you’re not leaving the banquet?” Selinda objected in dismay, but Martha was ushered away, the duke holding her hand until he could pass her to the sturdy arms of several of the Ducal Guard. He returned to the table, shaking his head.
“She’s a wonderful woman,” he said, whispering to the princess as he took his seat, “but she always has trouble with strong wines.”
“She is a delightful hostess!” insisted the guest of honor, but the duke didn’t seem to be listening anymore.
Instead, he rose to his feet.
“And now…” the Duke of Caergoth declared, speaking over the babble of the diners, “it is my great privilege to offer a toast to our most charming, and beautiful, visitor.”
The room fell reasonably silent, though Selinda couldn’t help noticing that there was more talking, whispering, laughing than there would have been at a Palanthian gathering.
“We are graced by a lady whose elegance, charm, and wit can mean only great auguries for the upcoming conference of Solamnic lords. Indeed, it is my fervent prayer that her wise counsel in these talks will open the way toward a new era of peace and cooperation among the lords of the three orders.
“We stand at a crossroads now… an opportunity when the future beckons as never before. The Evil Ones glimmer from the shadows. The dark shadows. We of Solamnia, we bring light into those shadows. We cast that light of truth, of justice, of the Oath and the Measure into the darkest of lightless shadows. The Evil Ones can only cower as we hold true to our just and righteous course.
“This lady who is our guest, well, she is the very embodiment of that torch, that righteous light. In the name of her father, our own Lord Regent Du Chagne-who has almost single-handedly brought that light into Palanthas and helped to spread it across all the plains-we salute her and ourselves!”
The duke raised his wine glass with his right hand. “Through the dark years since the War of Souls we have struggled and strived to bring civilization back to these long-suffering lands. We of the Rose, here in Caergoth- together with the worthy nobles of the Sword in Thelgaard and of the Crown in Solanthus-ever do we look toward the great city in the north for leadership, for guidance, for good counsel. Palanthas! Aye, Palanthas, the noble keystone in the centuries-old arch that is Solamnia. No place has stood against evil, has stood as a beacon of righteousness, more than have the great nations of Solamnia.
“To the great city of Palanthas, to the noble Lord Regent of that great city, and to his most gracious daughter who is here with us tonight: let us cry thrice hail, and drink a toast to the glory, the wisdom, and the long-standing might of Palanthas!”
“Hail! Hail, hail!”
The cry rocked the great hall, so forceful that Selinda was taken aback. It was dizzying to think that all of these people put such faith in herself and her house. Nevertheless, she stood swiftly and gracefully, very glad that she had been careful with the wine.
“My most kind and hospitable host, I thank you,” she declared. “On behalf of my father, in the legacy of the Council of Whitestone, and with all our prayers for the future, I most humbly aspire to prove worthy of the many flatteries you have offered.”
Selinda lifted her glass and all those present did the same, goblets clinking around the room. They all drank, and the great hall filled with cheers.
Sitting down again, the princess was amazed and delighted as a procession of servants flowed through the massive doors from the kitchen. She had been been to many banquets in Palanthas where the fare had consisted of dainty roasted fowls, or slices of ham graced with apples and plums, or bits of fish arranged fashionably on golden platters. That was not the Caergoth way: Here they brought out whole pigs roasted, and set upon massive platters carried by two burly men. Milk was poured from massive, ice-encrusted jugs, and those who wanted ale simply wandered over to one of several kegs set up in various parts of the great hall.
Selinda ate more than she ever had a single sitting before, and washed it down with the southern ale that, she decided, was smoother and less presumptuous than its Palanthian cousin.
The duke seemed to come alive as the evening progressed, chatting with Selinda about the glories of his realm, most of which seemed to center around the city’s position as a natural seaport.
“Of course, we have problems, too,” he admitted at one point. “The goblin crisis here isn’t what it is in Thelgaard and Solanthus, closer to the Garnet Mountains, but we do find the wretches skulking about now and then. I have a prime specimen locked up in my dungeon right now!”
“Really!” said Selinda. “We never see any goblins in Palanthas!”
“Well, one day I hope to say the same thing about Caergoth,” the duke professed. “My man here, Captain Reynaud, captured this one in the Garnet Mountains and brought him here for interrogation.”
“Really?”
The princess leaned forward, out of the corner of her eye regarding the knight with whom the duke had earlier been arguing. The knight was a man with slick black hair and a long mustache that curled into twin prongs, like the horns of a steer. Now the man cocked an ear, hearing them and assuming a humble expression.
He waved a hand dismissively. “It was nothing, really. We had to kill a few of his comrades. They were pickets, on the ridge around a huge clan of the beggars. We chained him up and brought him back here, quick as you like.” Reynaud spoke as though it were a simple business, but the princess noticed the hard edge in his eye and perceived a stern, even cruel set to his thin lips.
