ignored. Arne couldn’t recall that she had ever spoken to him.
The ceremony droned on. Finally those present were brought forward, a few at a time, to swear fealty to the new prince. The peeragers seemed dazed. Probably they had never heard of a denaming, either. They took their oaths mechanically and returned to their places in silence.
After them came the one-namers attached to the court. Then all of the lashers present were sworn as a group.
Arne and the other spectators were overlooked until one of the officials suddenly remembered the peer’s first server had not yet been sworn. Then his little group of one-namers was hurried forward.
Arne came last of all. He touched his knee to the ground, the land warden recited the formula in a voice now cracking with fatigue, and Arne firmly repeated it. As he got to his feet, the old man leaned forward and whispered to him. “The peer wants to see you. The prince does, too. Meet me at my lodge, and I will take you to the palace.”
Arne murmured, “Certainly, Master.”
He wondered how the peer would be able to conduct audiences after the prolonged, exhausting ceremony. She seemed to have lost consciousness.
The drum sounded. Surrounded by her guard, the peer was carried away. The wardens and the new prince followed. After them came the remainder of the court in the order of its arrival: Peeragers, the court one-namers, and then the various guards.
Again the spectators were left until last. They drifted toward their horses and wagons, leaving Arne alone. He had much to think about. He waited, a solitary figure in the broad meadow, until everyone else had vanished from sight, and then he slowly made his way to the court entrance.
As he plodded up the steep, spiraling road that rose to the castle, he was saluted by every lasher posted along the way. The land warden’s house and garden, and the lodge in which he worked, were on the level just below the palace, and the crusty old official was waiting for him at the turning.
He greeted Arne with a sigh. “It has been a tiring day.”
“A bewildering day,” Arne said. “A day of strange events. I understood very little of what was happening. Why are the lashers saluting me?”
“The peer ordered it. I told you how angry she was. She is determined no first server of the Peer of Midlow will ever be lashed again. As a reminder of today’s ceremony, every lasher in the peerdom has to salute you.”
Arne thought it would be achievement enough for the lashers just to remember the salute. They would quickly forget the deed that prompted it. “How is the peer?” he asked.
“Exhausted. I was afraid the strain would be too much for her, but she insisted she had to do it. She was right, of course. She did have to do it.”
“She looked awfully weak.”
“She is awfully weak, but she insists on seeing you. Determination is all that keeps her going. She is determined to see the end of this—to see that Midlow is ready for whatever comes—before she dies.”
They walked to the next level and took the long avenue to the low, sprawling palace. The guards posted there saluted both of them, giving Arne’s salute a special flourish. Inside, the hushed atmosphere was deathlike.
A group of servers had gathered near the entrance. They looked stricken. They were the former prince’s personal servants, and the denaming of the prince had cost them their places. Down through the sikes, they had inflicted an unending series of cruel discourtesies on the prince’s totally unimportant younger sister. Now that object of their disdain would be choosing her own servers, and none of them would be included.
In the days of the peer’s good health, she had received Arne in a small room near the entrance where she worked at an old, ornately carved desk that her mother had salvaged from a ruin. When her health began to worsen, she transacted business from a bedside chair. Later, as she became still weaker, she reclined on the bed propped up by pillows. Now she lay corpse-like, as though the effort to turn her head toward Arne was more than she could manage. Delor, the one-name server who had been her close companion from childhood, stood nearby and watched over her anxiously.
Each time Arne saw the peer, the ravages of disease had written new chapters of pain and suffering on her face, but always the steely determination had been there. She refused to succumb.
Now even her determination seemed exhausted. As he knelt beside her bed, she tiredly stretched out her hand to him. “Arne,” she murmured. Her eyes remained closed; her voice was no more than a whisper, weak, tired. “I am sorry for Terril Deline. The fault was mine as much as hers. She was a beautiful child and such a beautiful prince—but I overlooked what she did too long and too often.” The tired voice broke. “I have done what I could to make amends. I do hope things will go well for Elone Jermile.”
Suddenly she opened her eyes and stared at him. “Twice your father saved the peerdom, Arne. He and the one-namers. He saved it once for my mother and once for me. Did you know that? When he was as close to death as I am now, he told me you would make a better first server than he had been. You are still little more than a boy, but already you have saved the peerdom and more. You have saved the Ten Peerdoms. I don’t know how you did it. The Peer of Weslon said there was no way to stop the wild lashers, and most of the peeragers ran off like the cowards they are, but you took your one-namers and destroyed the lashers utterly. Those who saw the battlefield said there were dead lashers lying everywhere and no one ever won a more overwhelming victory. The other peers wanted to give you a second name and make you a peerager, but I told them you were invaluable to all of us just as you are—as a one-namer and my first server. You saved the peerdom—the Ten Peerdoms—and the prince’s guard lashed you.”
She was exhausted and fighting for breath, but for the moment her indignation had aroused her. “Each of my subjects, peerager, one-namer, no-namer, and lasher, has a responsibility to the peerdom, and the peerdom bears a responsibility to each of them. One-namers know that. Too many peeragers don’t. I have made certain that the new prince knows. I don’t have to ask you to give her the same loyalty you have given to me. I know you will.”
Her eyes closed again. Her breath was coming in a whistling wheeze. Her lips moved again. “Have you any favor to ask of me, Arne?” She didn’t say “last favor” but Arne knew what she meant.
Arne thought for a moment. “There is one thing, Majesty. The prince’s guard acted on the prince’s orders in raiding Midd Village. Its conduct during the raid was inexcusable, and the lashings were deserved, but not the loss of numbers. Give the guard to me, Majesty, and I will use it to start the army we have long needed. Further delay might be fatal.”
The peer raised up for a moment and looked at Arne intently. Then she turned her gaze on the land warden, nodded, and sank back.
The land warden touched Arne’s arm. As he got to his feet, the peer’s eyes opened again. “Arne—did I do the right thing? About the prince?”
Arne clasped her hand and spoke firmly. “Majesty, you did the right thing. You did what had to be done. If Terril Deline had become peer, Midlow would have been torn apart in less than a mont.”
She whispered, “Thank you.”
The Land Warden led Arne away.
In an adjoining room, the new prince was waiting. Arne and the land warden dropped to one knee and then got to their feet again. The prince said to her uncle, “How is she?”
“Tired,” the land warden said. “Terribly tired, but still fighting. She has a fierce determination.”
The prince turned to Arne. The astonishing upheaval in her status seemed to have matured her. Her poise surprised him. She said, “The peer has made it clear to me that the success of my reign will depend upon you. I already knew that. All of my life, whenever anything needed to be done or whenever anything went wrong, the first server was sent for. When I was a child, it was Arjov, your father. Now it is you. We are both still young. My hope is that we will grow old together and I will always have you to turn to. I make you one solemn promise. In this peerdom, no lasher will ever again raise his whip to a one-namer, and the first server is to be accorded all of the respect due a peerager—by everyone in the peerdom, including the peeragers.”
Arne thanked her.
“I will send for you soon,” she said. “I have much to learn, and there is an enormous amount of work to be done.”
