The Knight, the Harp, and the Maiden Page 3

  “Arrangements, Reyerne?” Juilene set the harp aside, and gestured for her teacher to join her on the bench. Her father was bellowing for his scribe; it was extremely unlikely he would even remember Reyerne’s request if no one mentioned it again.

  Reyerne sat, pulling his robes around his thin shoulders. “I have a little money saved, my lady. Your father was a most generous employer—his wages to teach you were far more than I ever needed. And so I am thinking of finding a little house in the city, after you marry, and perhaps taking on another pupil or two. Something to occupy my time, but nothing taxing.” He paused and smiled ruefully at her. “I doubt I shall ever have a student as able as you.”

  “Oh, Reyerne.” Impulsively, Juilene kissed the old man’s cheek. “I am sorry Father is so—so stubborn about letting me perform at the Festival. He just has such strong ideas about what is right and proper.”

  “And I don’t blame him, my lady.” Reyerne rested his age-spotted hands on his knees. “He should be concerned with the proper order of things. It only makes me sad to see such talent as yours wasted. Everyone here loves your playing and your singing, and all the children love the stories you tell—” Abruptly he broke off, staring into the distance. “Ah, well. Soon enough you will have children of your own to tell them to, my lady,” he finished. “Perhaps it is nothing but an old man’s pride in the best student he has ever had the privilege to teach.”

  Pride made her straighten and hold her harp tightly. She basked in the music master’s praise, even as something in her rebelled at the restrictive circumscriptions of her life. But better not to think of it now. She might as well make the most of the time she had left. “Listen to the variation I made up, and tell me what you think.”

  Reyerne smiled once more, and settled back, nodding his head, as she ran her fingers over the strings. The notes rippled and she frowned a little, trying to remember the particular combination she had thought so pleasing.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw her father’s eyes shift toward the door, and he broke off speaking in the middle of a word. His scribe paused in writing, and Juilene saw the man’s mouth open, even as the great doors of the outer entrance to the hall slammed open with a loud bang. A voice as familiar as it was unexpected rang out, “My lord Jiroud, my mother begs your help in the hour of our need.”

  Amazed, Juilene turned to stare, the harp strings vibrating beneath her suddenly still fingers. Arimond stood in the doorway, poised at the top of the shallow steps that led down into the great hall. His cloak was carelessly tossed over his arm, and his hair was windswept. Without even pausing to scan the hall for her presence, he strode down the steps, toward her father’s central chair, one hand outstretched.

  “What’s wrong, boy?” Jiroud half rose from his seat, waving away his scribe with one hand as he beckoned to Arimond with the other.

  Arimond swallowed hard and wiped a dirty glove over his face. “It’s my sister. She was found an hour or so ago in the lower meadow by the river. She’d been set upon by—” Abruptly he broke off, and Juilene handed her harp to Reyerne.

  She sprang from her seat and ran to his side, gripping one arm. She could feel the tense muscles beneath his muddied tunic. Hair was plastered to his neck and cheeks, and he looked as though he had come straight from the practice fields without bothering to change.

  “By whom?” bellowed Jiroud. “Outlaws? I thought we’d cleared the last of the scum—”

  “No, my lord.” Arimond’s hand tightened on Juilene’s but it was the only sign he gave that he was aware of her presence. “She says it was Lindos’s men. And she managed to tear off a scrap—” Here he fumbled in the pouch he wore at his waist, and pulled out a dark piece of fabric. “These are their colors.”

  Jiroud rose to his feet at the name. His face darkened considerably. “Are you sure of this, boy?” His voice was soft, but in it Juilene heard the edge that made even the most hardened of all her father’s soldiers quiver in their boots.

  Arimond nodded and handed the tattered scrap to Jiroud, who met Arimond’s eyes briefly, then turned the piece of material slowly in his hands, examining each side of it. “This blood—”

  “My sister managed to inflict some damage of her own,” Arimond answered.

  Jiroud nodded. His grim gaze fell on Juilene, and he shook his head. “And you, my lady, think I’m harsh because I won’t have you wandering the countryside dressed up in songsayer’s rags.” He shook his head and gave a short snort as he turned to the seneschal. “Have my horse saddled. I’ll go to your mother directly, boy.” His eyes flicked over the couple, from Juilene to Arimond and back. “Stay with my daughter if you wish. You’ve done all you can for your sister.”

  Arimond glanced down at Juilene and squeezed her hand. “Thank you, my lord.”

  Without another word, Jiroud turned on his heel and left the hall as anxious servants scurried in his wake. Juilene gazed up at her betrothed. He was tall and blond and just a few years older than she, and she was closer to Arimond and his sister, Arimelle, than she was to her own brother, Lazare, who was more than a dozen years her senior.

  “Come and sit,” she murmured as the flurry of activity subsided and the hall was once more peaceful.

  He drew a deep breath and turned to her, bringing her hand to his lips. “Forgive me, sweetheart, for not greeting you properly.”

  Juilene shook her head impatiently. “Tell me what happened to Melly.” She led him to one of the benches before one of the high hearths, and drew him down beside her. She glanced around. Reyerne had withdrawn with her harp. Except for two servants the hall was deserted. She beckoned to the nearest. “Would you like something to drink?”

  He nodded. “Anything.”

  “Bring us some cider,” Juilene said as the servant approached, wiping his hands on his apron.

  Arimond waited until the servant had gone and the other was out of earshot. His clothes reeked of sweat, and the odor of the stables. “I’m sorry, Juilene. I know I don’t look—or smell—very good.”

  “Never mind that, just tell me what happened.”

  Arimond drew a deep breath as though to compose himself by force. “I can’t. It’s too terrible.”

  Images raced through Juilene’s mind, every terrible thing she could possibly imagine. “Arimond”—she gripped his arm—“please, you have to tell me—how bad can she be?”

  “She’ll be lucky to live. How’s that? And if she does live, she’ll be lucky to walk. They broke both her legs, one of her hands, they tore out locks of her hair—” He stopped at the look on Juilene’s face. “I told you it was terrible. But I’ll make him pay—by the goddess, I will make him pay. I swear it.” He gazed into the hearth, where a small fire smoldered.

  Juilene could feel the tension in the muscles of his upper arm as she pressed next to him. A long shudder went through his body, and when he turned his face to look at her, she saw tears forming in his eyes.

  “I’ll kill the bastard, I swear it. I’ll take him apart with my own hands—thurge or not, he’ll pay.”

  “Arimond,” Juilene whispered, smoothing the tangled strands away from his face. “Father will know what to do. But please—will she live?”

  He ran a grimy hand over his forehead. “I don’t know. Branward doesn’t know. They stopped just short of killing her. I suppose even they didn’t dare that.”

  “Oh, goddess,” whispered Juilene. The thought of her friend, beaten and abused, was more than she could stand. She clutched Arimond’s arm. “And you’re certain it was Lindos’s men?”

  “That scrap proves it, doesn’t it? Those are his colors. And you know as well as I do he doesn’t even attempt to control them. He lets them rape and plunder and pillage where they will—you know it, Juilene—don’t try to convince me otherwise. They roam this countryside in gangs. Soon not a woman will be safe if this keeps up.”

  “You must appeal to the Over-Thurge.”

  “Old Blaise?” Arimond shook his head. “He
’s weak, sick—why else would Lindos so blatantly defy all the rules of decency?”

  “But he is the High Thurge of the Conclave, not just the Over-Thurge of Sylyria. All of them answer to him. Surely they will have some say over this master-thurge—Lindos is only a master-thurge after all—”

  “Ah, my jewel.” He interrupted her with a rueful smile and a shake of his head. “You are so young—you believe the best of everyone. The Conclave cares nothing for the common folk—haven’t you guessed that? What goes on among the master-thurges in obscure corners of Sylyria doesn’t concern them—”

  “Then Father will appeal to the King.”

  He shook his head again. “And what will the King do? Send an emissary?” He gave a soft snort. “I don’t think so. And you know as well as I do that even if your father himself confronts Lindos, he will only deny it was his men. He’ll say the scrap came from a stolen tunic or something. And by the time he gets around to denying it, the scratches Melly did manage to inflict will have healed, and there will be no proof at all. Just the word of an hysterical girl, they’ll say.”

  Juilene looked up as the servant approached bearing a silver tray with two goblets. She nodded to him to put it down, and handed Arimond one of the goblets. “Here. Drink this.” She raised the other to her lips and sipped, amazed at how her fingers shook.

  “There’s only one thing to do, Juilene. If Lindos is going to be stopped, I shall have to stop him myself.” He sipped the cider and stared into the hearth.

  “Stop him? But how? You can’t go riding up to his gate and challenge him. He’ll laugh.”

  “Let him laugh. And what’s to say I can’t? There’re no rules against challenging a thurge.”

  “Arimond, think of what you’re saying.” A tremor went through Juilene. She knew this mood. Ordinarily Arimond was the kindest and gentlest of men. But once he had his mind made up to do something, nothing stopped him—not the threat of death or serious bodily injury. Nothing. If he had it in his mind to confront the wizard, there was little she was likely to do about it. Even her father was not likely to change his mind. “Please wait and see what Father thinks, Mondo,” she said softly, using the old childish name for him. “You know at the very least he’ll call a Gathering.”

  A bitter smile twisted his mouth. “That’s what you both called me, wasn’t it? We were Mondo and Melly and Jewels—and nothing was ever going to separate us, was it? She might die, Juilene. When I left, Mother didn’t think there was much hope. And even if she does get better, she won’t be the same. Never.”

  Old memories of childhood flooded back, and Juilene’s eyes filled with tears. She bit her lip as her mouth quivered. “I know Melly is very bad,” she managed. “But I don’t want you to risk your life. I couldn’t bear to lose you.”

  For a long moment he stared at her, and then he gathered her in his arms, drawing her close. He pressed his lips into the thick mass of curls, and wrapped his arms around her. She nestled close to him, savoring the comfort of his strength. “Don’t you see, Jewels?” he whispered against her hair. “If someone doesn’t stop him, no one will be safe. It’s bad enough that peasant women have been assaulted in broad daylight. And Melly only wandered down to the meadows where we used to play—if she was vulnerable, so are you. So are all the women of the entire district, noble or not. And I couldn’t bear it if anything happened to you and I knew that there was something I could have done to prevent it.”

  She twined her fingers in his tunic. “Please, please, talk to Father. How could you alone possibly prevent it?”

  “What if I told you I thought there was a way?”

  She pulled back a little and frowned into his eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “A way to rid the land of Lindos forever.”

  “Invoke his doom, you mean?”

  “A thurge’s doom is always true, and he makes no secret of it. It’s why he’s so brazen, why he lets his men do as they will. He thinks no one can stop him.”

  “I suppose I understand that,” she said, turning the goblet in her fingers. “For what in the world is a non-born knight?”

  “I think it’s me,” he answered slowly.

  She stared at him in disbelief. “Arimond—” She bit her lip. Could he be mad with grief? “What makes you think such a thing?”

  “My real mother died giving birth to me,” he said. “You know that. I had to be cut from her womb after she was already dead. I wasn’t born the usual way—and my mother never gave me birth. Surely you see—if I am not the non-born knight, who could be? Such a thing is surely impossible.”

  She sank beside him on the bench, her hands fallen still in her lap. “When did you realize this?”

  “I’ve been thinking it for some time. I guess what really made me start to believe it was when the attacks by his men began to escalate. And Lindos never made any secret of his doom. His men laugh and brag of it on every street and in every tavern of every village in the district. He’s so sure such a thing is impossible, but listen, Juilene, isn’t that the way it works? The very thing you think you’ll never meet is often right under your nose? Isn’t that how the goddess herself incarnated?”

  Juilene knotted her fingers together, thoughts darting through her head like scattering fish. “Arimond,” she said at last. “If this is true—”

  “It is true,” he said. “You know it is.”

  “I know the story of your birth is true. I don’t know whether that makes you title non-born knight or not.”

  “A thurge’s doom is always true, isn’t it?”

  Juilene opened her mouth, then shut it. Was there any point in arguing with him? A thurge’s doom was always true, that much she knew and understood. A thurge’s doom was revealed when he or she accepted his or her power. It was no simple thing—to know the manner of one’s death. Although the foolish sometimes proclaimed it a blessing, wiser ones knew it for a curse. It was a terrible price to pay for the power, thought Juilene, and a terrible thing to live under the burden of the knowledge of one’s own death.

  “Yes,” she said at last. “A thurge’s doom is always true. And I know that Lindos is unusual, in that he makes no secret of his. But I cannot believe…” Her voice trailed off.

  “That I could be his doom? Just because you know me?” Anger and sorrow vied in his shifting expression.

  “No,” she said. “I don’t want anything to happen to you. If I lose you, I won’t have anything left either.”

  His expression softened and he drew her close. “Ah, Jewels. No harm will come to me, I swear it.”

  She relaxed against his chest. His fingertips stroked her scalp through the thick curly mass of her hair, and she could feel the roughened skin, the scars and calluses he bore even at his age. He meant to comfort her, but the scars only made her think of wounds, and that only made her think of Melly, lying close to death. She sighed. “What will you do? Lindos hardly ever lets anyone into his castle—and it isn’t likely that his guards will let you in, especially if you ride up to the gate and announce yourself as his doom.”

  “No,” he said, his cheek against the top of her head. “I know that. I have to find a way into the castle—a way to sneak in preferably at night, when the thurge will be in his bed, asleep. It will be an easy thing to kill him as he sleeps.”

  Juilene shivered. Easy, easy. Arimond kept using the word as though anything to do with Lindos was bound to be easy. She shook her head. “And just how do you think to accomplish that? The walls are always heavily guarded, even in the dead of night.”

  “Except on the nights of the Festival.”

  She pulled away from him. The Sacred Festival of Dramue, the nine days that celebrated the goddess’s life and death as a mortal woman, was less than a few turns of the calendar tree away. “But you still can’t simply walk into the castle—you know as well as I the stories that are told about that place. Some say that there are all sorts of traps, of things—horrible things—to protect the thurges. Lindos isn’t
the first thurge to live there, and who knows what all the others have left behind?” Juilene shuddered, remembering all the times the tales of the nursery maids had made it impossible for her to sleep. “And there’re bound to be some human guards as well. Lindos isn’t going to let all his guards and servants go to the Festival every night. No one does.”

  “I know,” he said. “And that’s where I need to ask you to help me.”

  She pulled away from him. “Me? How can I help you?”

  “You can get us into his keep. Once we’re in, you can distract him and I’ll find a way to kill him.”

  “But how can I get us in?” She stared at him in shock.

  “Because you can pretend to be a songsayer. Soon the countryside will be overrun with them. You know that as well as I.”

  Juilene drew a deep breath. It was true that even the smallest houses were expected to house at least one of the songsayers, the traveling musicians who went from town to town, telling stories, providing music and entertainment for the populace. At the Sacred Festival, they flocked to the cities in droves, since that had been the calling of the goddess in her earthly incarnation. Reyerne’s old teacher, Galicia, was not likely to be the only songsayer who would seek shelter beneath her father’s roof. And although many of them were legitimate, not all of them were gifted equally. But even the ones who were, as her father said, little more than traveling prostitutes, were supposed to be considered sacred to the goddess, and at Festival time, all were made welcome.