The Complete Lyonesse Part 18

He went forward slowly and entered through the broken door, into the parlor, and here he found the corpse of Grofinet, who had been suspended from the ceiling-beams by his lank legs and burned over a fire, presumably that he might be forced to reveal the location of s.h.i.+mrod's treasures. By the look of affairs, Gro-finet's tail had first been roasted away, inch by inch, on a brazier. At the last his head had been lowered into the flames. No doubt, in a hysteria, he had screamed out his knowledge, suffering agonies as much for his own weakness as for the fire he dreaded so much. And then, to silence his raving, someone had split his charred face with a cleaver.

s.h.i.+mrod looked under the hearth, but the gnarled object which represented his store of magical adjuncts was gone. He had expected nothing else. He knew rudimentary skills, a few charlatan's tricks, a clever spell or two. Never a great magician, s.h.i.+mrod was now barely a magician of any sort.

Melancthe! She had given him no more faith than he had given her. Still, he would have brought her no great harm, while she had sealed the portal against him, so that he should die in Irerly.

"Melancthe, dire Melancthe! For your crimes you will suffer! I escaped and so I won, but in that absence caused by you I lost my possessions and Grofinet lost his life; you will suffer accordingly!" So raved s.h.i.+mrod as he stalked about the manse.

The robbers who had seized upon his absence to pillage Trilda, they also must be captured and punished: who might they be?

The House Eye! Established for just such contingencies! But no, first he would bury Grofinet; and this he did, in a bower behind the manse, along with his friend's small possessions. He finished in the fading light of late afternoon. Returning inside the manse he set every lamp aglow, and built a fire in the fireplace. Still Trilda seemed bleak.

s.h.i.+mrod brought the House Eye down from the ridge-beam, and set it on the carved table in the parlor, where, upon stimulus, it recreated what it had observed during s.h.i.+mrod's absence.

The first few days pa.s.sed without incident. Grofinet zealously discharged his duties and all was well. Then, during the middle of a languid summer afternoon the nunciator cried out: "I spy two strangers, of ilk unknown. They approach from the south!"

Grofinet hurriedly donned his dress helmet and took up what he considered a posture of authority in the doorway. He called out: "Strangers, be so good as to halt! This is Trilda, manse of the Master Magician s.h.i.+mrod, and at the moment under my protection. Since I recognize no business with you, in courtesy go your way."

A voice replied: "We request of you refreshment: a loaf, a bite of cheese, a cup of wine, and we will travel onward."

"Come no further! I will bring you food and drink where you stand, then you must go your way at once. Such are my orders!"

"Sir knight, we shall do as you deem proper."

Grofinet, flattered, turned away, but was instantly seized and trussed tight with leather straps, and so began the dreadful business of the afternoon.

The intruders were two: a tall handsome man with the clothes and manners of a gentleman, and his subordinate. The gentleman was of fine and graceful physique; glossy black hair framed a set of well-shaped features. He wore dark green hunting leathers, with a black cape and carried the long sword of a knight.

The second robber showed two inches less of stature and six inches more of girth. His features were compressed, 'twisted, crumpled together, as if smeared. A nutmeg-brown mustache drooped over his mouth. His arms were heavy; his legs were thin and seemed to pain him as he walked, so that he used a careful mincing gait. It was he who worked mischief upon Grofinet, while the other leaned against a table drinking wine and offering suggestions.

At last the deed was done. Grofinet hung smoking; the involuted box of valuables had been taken from its hiding place.

"So far so good," declared the black-haired knight, "though s.h.i.+mrod has snarled his treasures into a riddle. Still, we have each done well."

"It is a happy occasion. I have toiled long and hard. Now I may rest and enjoy my wealth."

The knight laughed indulgently. "I rejoice for you. After a lifetime of lopping heads, winding the rack and twisting noses, you have become a person of substance, perhaps even of social pretension. Will you become a gentleman?"

"Not I. My face tells all. 'Here,' it says, 'stands a thief and a hangman.' So be it: good trades both, and alas for my sore knees that bar me from either."

"A pity! Such skills as yours are rare."

"In all truth, I've lost my taste for gut-cutting by firelight, and as for thieving, my poor sore knees are no longer fit for the trade. They bend both ways and snap aloud. Still, I won't deny myself a bit of purse-slitting and picking of pockets for amus.e.m.e.nt's sake."

"So where will you go for your new career?" "I'll be away to Dahaut and there I'll follow the fairs, and perhaps I'll become a Christian. If you need me, leave word in Avallon at the place I mentioned."

s.h.i.+mrod flew on feathered feet to Swer Smod. A proclamation hung on the door: The land is uneasy and the future is uncertain. Murgen must give over his ease that he may solve the problems of Doom. To those who have come as visitors he regrets his absence. Friends and persons in need may take shelter, but my protection is not guaranteed. To those who intend harm I need say nothing. They already know.

s.h.i.+mrod indited a message, which he left on the table of the main hall: There is little to say other than that I have come and gone. On my travels affairs went according to plan, but there were losses at Trilda. I will return, so I hope, within the year, or as soon as justice has been done. I leave in your care the gems of thirteen colors.

He ate from Murgen's larder, and slept on a couch in the hall.

In the morning he dressed in the costume of a wandering musician: a green brimless cap pointed at the front with a panache of owl's feathers, tight trousers of green twill, a blue tunic and a nut-brown cape.

On the great table he found a silver penny, a dagger and a small six-stringed cadensis of unusual shape which, almost of its own accord, produced lively tunes. s.h.i.+mrod pocketed the coin, tucked the dagger into his girdle, slung the cadensis over his shoulder. Then, departing Swer Smod, he set off across the Forest of Tantrevalles toward Dahaut.

Chapter 16.

IN A BELL-SHAPED CELL fourteen feet in diameter and seventy feet underground, days were differentiated by the most trivial circ.u.mstances: the drip of rain, the glimpse of blue sky, an extra crust in the rations. Aillas recorded the pa.s.sage of days by placing pebbles on a ledge. Each ten pebbles in the "unit" area yielded a single pebble in the "ten" area. On the day after nine "tens" and nine "units," Aillas placed a single pebble in the "hundred" area.

He was fed a loaf of bread, a jug of water and either a bundle of carrots or turnips, or a head of cabbage, every three days, by means of a basket lowered from above.

Aillas often wondered how long he would live. At first he lay inert, in apathy. At last, with vast effort, he forced himself to exercise: pus.h.i.+ng, pulling, jumping, tumbling. As his muscular tone returned, so rose his morale. Escape: not impossible. But how? He tried scratching handholds into the stone wall; the proportions and cross section of the cell guaranteed failure for this approach. He tried to lift the stones of the floor, that he might pile them and so reach the shaft, but the joints were too tight and the blocks too heavy: another program he was forced to discard.

The days pa.s.sed, one by one, and the months. In the garden the days and months also pa.s.sed and Suldrun swelled with the child conceived by Aillas and herself.

King Casmir had forbidden the garden to all but a deaf-mute kitchen maid.

Brother Umphred however considered himself, a priest of the cloth, exempt from the ban, and visited Suldrun after about three months. Hoping for news Suldrun tolerated his presence, but Brother Umphred could tell her nothing. He suspected that Aillas had felt the full weight of King Casmir's wrath, and since this was also Suldrun's belief, she put no more questions. Brother Umphred attempted a few half-hearted intimacies, at which Suldrun went into the chapel and closed the door. And Brother Umphred departed without noticing that Suldrun already had started to swell.

Three months later he returned and now Suldrun's condition was evident.

Brother Umphred made the sly observation: "Suldrun, my dear, you are becoming stout."

Without words Suldrun once more rose to her feet and went into the chapel.

Brother Umphred sat a few moments in deep reflection, then went to consult his register. He calculated forward from the date of marriage and arrived at a tentative birth-date. Since conception had occurred several weeks before the marriage, his date was just so much in error, a detail which escaped Brother Umphred's attention. The great fact was pregnancy: how best could he profit from this choice item of knowledge which seemed known only to himself?

Further weeks pa.s.sed by. Brother Umphred contrived a hundred schemes, but none gained him advantage and he held his tongue.

Suldrun well understood Brother Umphred's calculations. Her concern grew as her time approached. Sooner or later Brother Umphred must sidle up to King Casmir and, in that unlikely mingling of humility and impudence, disclose her precious secret.

What then? Her imagination dared not venture so far. Whatever might happen would not be to her liking.

The time grew short. In a sudden panic Suldrun scrambled up the hillside and over the wall. She hid herself where she could watch the peasants on their way to and from the market.

On the second day she intercepted Ehirme, who, after whispered exclamations of astonishment climbed over the stones and into the garden. She wept and hugged Suldrun, and demanded to know what had gone wrong with the plan to escape. All had been in readiness!

Suldrun explained as best she coukl.

"What of Aillas?"

Suldrun knew nothing. The silence was sinister. Aillas must be considered dead. Together they wept anew and Ehirme cursed the unnatural tyrant who would visit such misery upon his daughter.

Ehirme calculated months and days. She judged time against cycles of the moon, and so determined when Suldrun most likely would give birth. The time was near: perhaps five days, perhaps ten; no more, and all without a vestige of preparation.

"You shall run away again, tonight!" declared Ehirme.

Wistfully Suldrun rejected the idea. "You are the first they would think of, and terrible things would happen."

"What of the child? They will take it away from you."

Once more Suldrun could not restrain tears and Ehirme held her close. "Listen now to a crafty thought! My niece is a halfwit; three times she has come pregnant by the stable-boy, another half-wit. The first two infants died at once, from sheer confusion. She is already cramping and presently will deliver her third brat, which no one, least of all herself, wants. Be of good cheer! Somehow we shall rescue the situation."

Suldrun said sadly: "There is very little now to rescue."

"We shall see!"

Ehirme's niece bore her brat: a girl, according to external evidence. Like its predecessors, it went into convulsions, emitted a few squeaks and died face down in its own discharges.

The corpse was packed into a box, over which-since the niece had been persuaded to Christianity-Brother Umphred intoned a few pious words, and the box was taken off by Ehirme for burial.

At noon of the following day Suldrun went into labor. Close on sunset, haggard, hollow-eyed but relatively cheerful, she gave birth to a son whom she named Dhrun, after a Danaan hero who ruled the worlds of Arcturus.

Ehirme washed Dhrun well and dressed him in clean linens. Late in the evening she returned with a small box. Up under the olive trees she dug a shallow grave into which she unceremoniously slid the dead infant. She broke the box and burnt it in the fireplace. Suldrun lay on her couch watching with big eyes.

Ehirme waited until the flames died low and the baby slept. "Now I must leave. I will not tell you where Dhrun will go, so that, in all cases, he will be safe from Casmir. In a month or two, or three, you will disappear, and go to your baby and live thereafter, so I hope, without sorrow."

Suldrun said softly: "Ehirme, I fear!"

Ehirme hunched up her heavy shoulders. "In truth, I fear too. But whatever happens, we have done our best."

Brother Umphred sat at a small table of ebony and ivory, across from Queen Sollace. With great concentration he studied a set of wooden tablets, each carved with hermetic import understood only by Brother Umphred. To either side of the table burned candles of bayberry wax.

Brother Umphred leaned forward as if in astonishment. "Can it be? Another child born into the royal family?"

Queen Sollace uttered a throaty laugh. "There, Umphred, is either jest or nonsense."

"The signs are clear. A blue star hangs in the grotto of the nymph Merleach. Cambia.n.u.s ascends to the seventh; here, there-see them now!-are other nascents. No other meaning is plausible. The time is now. My dear queen, you must summon an escort and make inspection. Let your wisdom be the test!"

"'Inspection'? Do you mean ..." Sollace's voice trailed off into surmise.

"I know only what the tablets tell me."

Sollace heaved herself to her feet and summoned ladies from the adjoining parlor. "Come! Whim is on me to walk out of doors."

The group, chattering, laughing and complaining of the untoward exercise, marched up the arcade, sidled through the postern and picked their way down through the rocks to the chapel.

Suldrun appeared. Immediately she knew why they had come.

Queen Sollace gave her a critical inspection. "Suldrun, what is all this nonsense?"

"What nonsense, royal mother?"

"That you were pregnant with child. I see that this is not so, for which I give thanks. Priest, your tablets have deceived you!"

"Madame, the tablets are seldom wrong."

"But you can see for yourself!"

Brother Umphred frowned and pulled at his chin. "She is not now pregnant, so it would seem."

Queen Sollace stared at him a moment then swept to the chapel and looked within. "There is no child here."

"Then it would seem to be elsewhere."

Now exasperated, Queen Sollace swung upon Suldrun. "Once and for all, let us have the truth of this!"

Brother Umphred added thoughtfully, "If collusion exists, it can easily be discovered."

Suldrun turned Brother Umphred a glance of contempt. "I gave birth to a daughter. She opened her eyes on the world; she saw the cruelty in which life must be lived, and closed her eyes again. I buried her yonder in great sorrow."

Queen Sollace made a gesture of frustration and signaled a page boy. "Fetch the king; this is a matter for his attention, not mine. I would never have pent the girl here in the first place."

King Casmir arrived, already in a foul humor which he masked behind a face of somber impa.s.sivity.

King Casmir stared at Suldrun. "What are the facts?"

"I bore a child. She died."

Desmei's prediction, in regard to Suldrun's first-born son, jerked to the forefront of Casmir's mind. "Girl? A girl?"

For Suldrun deception was difficult. She nodded. "I buried her on the hillside."

King Casmir looked around the circle of faces and pointed to Umphred. "You, priest, with your dainty marriages and mincing cant: you are the man for this job. Bring hither the corpse."

Boiling with fury he could not express, Brother Umphred humbly bowed his head and went to the grave. In the final rays of afternoon, he pulled aside the black mold with delicate white hands. A foot below the surface he found the linen cloth in which the dead infant had been wrapped. As he dug away the dirt the cloth fell open to reveal the head. Brother Umphred paused in his digging. Through his mind pa.s.sed a swift set of images and echoes of past confrontations. The images and echoes broke and vanished. He' lifted the dead infant in its cloth and carried it to the chapel and placed it before King Casmir.

For an instant Brother Umphred looked toward Suldrun and met her gaze, and in that single glance conveyed to her all the bitter hurt her remarks across the years had done to him.

"Sire," said the priest, "here is the corpse of a female infant. It is not Suldrun's child. I performed final rites over this child three or four days ago. It is the b.a.s.t.a.r.d of one Megweth, by the groom Ralf."

King Casmir uttered a terse bark of laughter. "And I was so to be deceived?" He looked toward his entourage and pointed to a sergeant. "Take priest and corpse to the mother and learn the truth of this matter. If the infants have been transferred, bring with you the living child."

The visitors departed the garden, leaving Suldrun alone in the light of a waxing moon.

The sergeant, with Brother Umphred, visited Megweth, who gave quick information that the corpse had been given into the care of Ehirme for burial.

The sergeant returned to Haidion not only with Megweth, but also Ehirme.

Ehirme spoke humbly to King Casmir. "Sire, if I have done wrong, be sure that my reason was only love for your blessed daughter the Princess Suldrun, who does not deserve the woe of her life."

King Casmir lowered his eyelids. "Woman, are you declaring that my judgment in regard to the disobedient Suldrun is incorrect?"