Page 79 of Warrior Queen
Now to the nub of the matter that had been bugging me for a long time– since the name of the child had been revealed, in fact. “Does she… does the child show any signs of… of having inherited her mother’s powers?” And her father’s, of course. Debatable as to whose powers were the greater.
Karstyn stopped her kneading, her eyes narrowing. “I can’t rightly say, milady, seein’ as I haven’t seen the littlun for meself. But…” She leaned across the floury table toward me and lowered her voice. “My friend do say as she thinks there’s somethin’ queer about her. Somethin’ that she don’t quite like. A feelin’ that a child that age shouldn’t be givin’ her looks like she do. Knowin’ looks. An’ she not even two-year-old yet.”
Disquieting.
A shadow blocked the doorway, and I looked up, half expecting it to be the boy Nyle back with the cooked bread. But it wasn’t. Arthur stood there, looking in, silhouetted by the sunlight.
“Milord.” Karstyn bobbed a bow, wiping her hands again, eyes twinkling.
Arthur hopped down the three steps into the kitchen, a grin on his face. “Karstyn, it’s you. Well met, because I’m hungry. D’you have any of the delicacies here you used to once make for me?” He put a hand on my shoulder. “Apart from my wife, that is.”
Karstyn beamed at him. “I’ve honey cakes right here. Just like when you was a nipper.” She turned to a wide shelf at the back of the kitchen.
Wait? Arthur had known her when he was a boy? He’d never mentioned that to me before. Mind you, the last time we’d seen her, other things had been much more pressing– Morgawse and her newborn baby, his rivalry with his brother, getting us all to safety.
Karstyn whipped a cloth off a tray of honey cakes and carried them to the table.
Arthur pounced on it, picking up a flat cake in each hand. “My favorites. You have to make them every day while we’re here.” He beamed at me like a schoolboy, as though he didn’t have a care in the world and wasn’t within the city of his hated brother. “Karstyn was the best– and nicest– cook in the palace kitchens.” He chuckled. “How kind of my brother to let us have her here.” He popped a whole cake into his mouth, with very little difficulty, and made a valiant effort not to spit crumbs everywhere.
“And you’ve not changed a bit.” Karstyn chuckled, pushing the tray toward me.
I took one and bit into it, tasting the sweetness of the honey that was all but outweighed by the nuttiness of the cake. More like large biscuits, really, as they hadn’t risen as you’d have expected a cake to.
“Is there milk?” Arthur asked, perching himself on the table, bottom in the flour and legs dangling. “I remember how when I used to come to the kitchens, it was always you who gave me milk and honey cakes, right from when I could first escape my nurse. Seeing you’s transported me right back there.”
Karstyn poured him a horn beaker of milk from a jug on the side and he took a long swig that left his mouth mustached with white. Just to prove that even a king can revert to being a child without much encouragement.
*
The Council begantwo days later, under a clear autumn sky, a delay having been caused as we waited for some of the more far-flung kings to arrive. According to Merlin, both Lot of Lleuddiniawn and Caw of Alt Clut had turned up, not together, of course, and thankfully set up camp outside the city as far apart as they could get. Each king had brought a sizeable force as though expecting trouble.
“Will we propose the system of messengers?” I asked Arthur, as we prepared to ride to the Council Hall, along with the twenty warriors allowed to accompany us. The riders, and a number of servants on foot, made the stable courtyard appear overcrowded. Knowing Arthur, the rest of our considerable force were probably already strategically positioned either in the hall’s upstairs viewing galleries or around the forum amongst the waiting crowds.
“Iwill,” Arthur said, hands on my waist. With no apparent effort, he lifted me up onto the flat pad that had been fixed behind Merlin’s saddle, and which I was expected to balance on as I was wearing a long gown of fine blue wool. No women in braccae allowed into the Council Hall. I was expected to dress and behave like a queen– the High King’s queen, at that.
Arthur turned away, and as Merlin’s horse side-stepped, probably under the unaccustomed extra weight, I had to put a steadying hand on Merlin’s waist, tucking my fingers into his belt. “What does he mean,I?” I hissed. “It wasmyidea. Not his.”
Merlin twisted to peer at me. “Women are not allowed to speak at the Council.”
Well, not a surprise. No rights for women in this world. But very annoying. And the fact that Arthur hadn’t told me earlier made me bristle with anger at my own stupidity. He’d probably kept quiet so he didn’t have to face an argument, which was quite definitely what he’d have got. Too late now. He was mounting the horse Drustans was holding for him, too far away for me to speak to unless I shouted, and I wasn’t about to make a spectacle of myself by doing that. Besides which, it would get me precisely nowhere.
I had to content myself with shooting him a glare.
With the escort ready now, and Cei beside him, Arthur led the way out of the courtyard.
To my surprise, many of the townspeople had lined the narrow streets to the forum to watch us pass. The Council only occurred every couple of years, and although at the last one Arthur had been created High King, presumably it hadn’t been the same as the spectacle of actually having a High King already in place. And we made a splendid sight.
Arthur, astride the bay horse Garbaniawn had gifted him, wore his customary dark clothing, but his tunic had gold embroidery in a thick, elaborate band around the neck, cuffs and hem and was of the finest wool. His short riding cloak was his one nod to color, dark on the outside but lined with a rich, deep red. From the madder plant, and one of the most difficult colors to obtain so the most unusual. On his head he’d set the gold circlet of his rank, hopefully sufficiently jammed down that it wouldn’t dislodge on the ride to the Hall.
I’d cheated with my own gold circlet, and had the timid girl who’d been waiting on me stitch it in four places to my hair, which hung loose in a rich chestnut veil to my waist. That thread was going to be fun to get out later. If I ended up with four short tufts, I was going to be very cross.
With my hand still tucked into Merlin’s belt, as this wasn’t the most secure way to travel, I surveyed the faces of Viroconium’s townspeople as we passed. Tradesmen, artisans, the old, the young, men, women, children, even a few mangy dogs. They might have been Cadwy’s people, but Arthur was a homegrown hero to them, a boy many of them had watched grow up. They cheered him as he passed, and they cheered me, too.
“The Ring Maiden. God save the Ring Maiden.”
“Long live the High King.”
“Uthyr’s boy.”
