A serving girl knocked lightly on the door and she bade the girl enter. The maid presented a parchment bearing the royal seal, and said, ‘From the palace.’
Turning away from the girl, she broke the seal on the parchment. Quickly reading the message, she read it again to ensure she hadn’t misunderstood anything. She assumed her observers were likely to know what was in this message. Turning back to her maid, she said, ‘The royal blue dress, I think, the one with the white-trimmed hem, not the silver. It is after all, court, not a palace gala. Tell Gregor to have the coach ready in an hour. We are going back to the palace.’
‘Yes, madam,’ said the maid.
Waiting for her maid to go about her business, Franciezka sat back as if calmly considering what was happening, but inward she was seething with conflict. By nature, she hated anything happening in which she had no control, and even though life had taught her control was most often an illusion, she found she was happiest when influencing events and people. She had learned every weapon there was from fear to love, seduction to bribery, gratitude and taking advantage of other people’s better nature. Her only saving grace was that it was all for the Crown, and if she’d willingly give her own life for King and country, she had no problem giving others’, let alone causing a little annoyance, anger, fear, or an occasional broken heart.
What was troubling her most of all at the moment, was the idea that Lord John Worthington was making an unexpected move. Not even a simple case of him doing something recognizable at an unexpected time, but rather doing something totally unexpected, irrespective of the timing.
He was hosting a gala for the King.
Reading court language as well as anyone, the tone of the invitation told her that nothing short of being on her death bed could permit her declining. Moreover, something of significance, even something momentous, was being celebrated.
She was doubly suspicious because it was so sudden. Even modest parties by the Crown’s standards took days to prepare. But then it occurred to her that perhaps it wasn’t so sudden. Perhaps preparations had been underway for days because Lord John knew exactly what was coming.
They couldn’t be celebrating the death of King Gregory: even with magic it might take some time to dispatch the King. No, this was something else. And it couldn’t be Lord John’s announcement of his son’s betrothal to Stephane, since she couldn’t be betrothed in absentia. Her curiosity was piqued, and that outweighed her caution. She picked up a small bell and rang it. A moment later the maid reappeared and Franciezka said, ‘I’ve changed my mind. The red, with the silver trim, and the ruby earrings. Now, send for Millicent and tell her I need my hair up within the hour.’
‘Yes, my lady!’ The maid ran off.
Then she remembered something Jim had said to her. ‘Whatever happens, at least it’s interesting.’ That had been in another context, but it certainly applied here.
Then she wondered where he was. For the first time in her life, she worried for his safety.
‘Damn that man,’ she whispered to no one.
Carriages rolled into the palace as the sun set in the west. Footmen were turned out in formal palace livery, pale green jackets with white silk collars, pale yellow hose, and their heads topped with small yellow caps to match the hose. Idly, Franciezka considered there must be someone locked deep within the palace, unknown to any but a few key people — the King alone perhaps — whose only task in life was to devise odd uniforms for the servants in Roldem, a uniform that changed each year.
Fashions for the nobles changed as well, of course. She knew a handful of designers and their seamstresses competed each year to set the tone for the following year’s ‘look’ — how low the neckline should be or how many petticoats were to be worn under the skirt, what colours were current and which adornments were now passe. Once a look had been achieved, others slavishly followed, and a year later those styles were being imitated in the Isles and the Eastern Kingdoms.
At least the Keshians, tradition bound as they were, avoided such petty concerns about fashion. More to the point, such gowns and jackets would have been uncomfortably hot to wear near the Overn Deep. As her carriage came to a stop, she decided the Keshians were extremely practical to run around nearly naked. If she had to endure that beastly heat, she’d do the same.
The door opened and a footman extended his hand to allow Franciezka to descend from her carriage with grace, despite the ridiculous skirt fashion dictated she wear this year. At least she liked the colour, a brilliant crimson that suited her colouring and brought out what colour there was in her otherwise pale cheeks. Jim had once observed that if she were any more fair she’d be as white as muslin. Damn, she was thinking of him again …
She moved as quickly as decorum permitted from the massive courtyard up the sweeping staircase that led into the palace. Once inside, she hurried towards the royal apartment, half-expecting to be barred by guards under orders from Lord John Worthington. She was relieved that not once was she challenged and by the time she reached the royal family’s apartments within the heart of the palace, an illusion of normalcy had almost returned.
As she approached, two pages pulled wide the large doors leading into the royal quarters, a palace within the palace effectively. The entranceway to the family’s living area was larger than Lady Franciezka’s entire house, a two-storey, vaulted antechamber in which a half-dozen ladies already were gathered to accompany the Queen. She knew that in another part of the apartment a like number of lords of the Kingdom would be waiting to accompany the King. The oddest quality of royal life, Franciezka had always observed, was how the King and Queen shared a bed every night, but on formal occasions dressed in different rooms, departed from the apartment through separate doors, and met in the large hallway before their entrance to the throne room or the grand hall as if arriving from different places. She had once asked the royal historian about it, and he had been at a loss for an answer. The best he could summon up was that this was the way it had always been done.
She nodded greetings to the other ladies who returned polite words, then swept past them into the Queen’s private chambers. The Queen was just rising from her vanity table, having endured, no doubt with her usual good grace, the ministrations of her attendants in applying whatever final touches they deemed necessary to achieve fashion perfection.
Franciezka curtseyed before her Queen and then came to kiss her on either cheek.
‘You’ve been gone too long, my girl,’ Queen Gertrude scolded with affection. She hugged her and whispered, ‘We have no idea what is taking place. Lord John has said nothing.’
Franciezka nodded. ‘We must all be ready for anything.’
‘My daughter?’
‘Safely away,’ Franciezka whispered back.
Barely holding back tears, the Queen said, ‘Good.’
A page approached and said, ‘Majesty, the King is ready.’
So practised were the ladies of the court that it took no more than five minutes to have everyone in place outside the entrance to the Queen’s boudoir. A nod from an assistant to the Master of Ceremonies had both the King’s and Queen’s parties moving at precisely the right moment, so that they both reached the intersection of the grand hall entrance and the hallway marking the boundary of the royal apartment.
Massive doors swung wide as the Master of Ceremonies intoned, ‘My lords, ladies, and gentlemen, the King!’
Franciezka was one step behind the Queen, in her place on the right as her senior lady-in-waiting, but something felt amiss. Then she recognized what it was. The four children were missing. Crown Prince Constantine, the Princes Alber and Grandprey and Princess Stephane should be entering behind their parents. The court had a pensive quality to it, as well, for while this was ostensibly a gala, there was obviously nothing to celebrate, at least in the minds of the lords and ladies in attendance.
Franciezka saw Lord Servan, the King’s nephew and her most trusted agent, the man who would take over all of Roldem’s intelligence concerns should anything happen to her. He barely nodded greeting and she inclined her head slightly.
Nearby stood three young lords about whom Franciezka had mixed feelings. Foreign born all, they had risen in Roldem’s service and been knighted by the King, and all had some sort of relationship with Jim that annoyed her all the more. Yet she had been reassured more than once by Servan that she could count on their loyalty to the end. Lords Jonathan, known as ‘Jommy’ to his close friends, Tad, and Zane stood quietly alert, much as they had
