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impudently and quaffed another cupful of cider. Wait for lights-out and take
ourselves into the cellar while the cook s off watch. He snores enough to
conceal any noise we might make. If we each carry out a pair of kegs apiece,
it should take us only about forty nights of work to
Hush your chatter, Mierre said gruffly. Fool s talk is not what his
highness wants to hear.
What other plan have you? Kaltienne retorted. He laughed. Oh, I see.
Nocturnal
raids would interfere with your own plans, eh, Mierre? You ve caught the eye
of that lusty housemaid Atheine, the one with the mole on her
That s enough, Mierre growled.
Frowning, Gavril drew back from them and reached inside his fur-lined doublet
to touch his Circle. Cardinal Noncire, his tutor back at Savroix, had warned
him that his fellow fosters might already be well versed in the coarsest
habits of carnality. Mierre, bigger than the rest of them, with his bullish
shoulders and muscular neck, seemed afflicted with a steady lust that pursued
any young female servant in the hold. Several ambitious wenches had offered
their wares to Gavril, but he had been warned about that, too. He wasn t going
to destroy his piety for a few minutes release in the grimy arms of some
turnip-scrubber.
Be glad you aren t a Netheran and forced to stay celibate until you re
knighted,
Kaltienne said with a sly grin. I saw you with Atheine behind the barn
yesterday morning. Those white legs of hers are longer than
With a quick, apprehensive glance at Gavril, Mierre turned on Kaltienne and
whacked him hard across the back. Whooping for breath, Kaltienne doubled over.
His empty cup dropped from his fingers and rolled across the floor.
Gavril ignored him and glared impatiently at Mierre. The burly foster met his
prince s gaze and turned a faint shade of pink.
I beg your highness s forgiveness, he said. He was large, gruff, clumsy, and
unpolished, but he was learning courtly ways fast. Gavril valued him for his
strength, his growing loyalty, his ambitions, and his natural shrewdness.
Mierre frowned at Kaltienne, who was still wheezing. Kaltienne never knows
when to hold his tongue.
Pardon is given, Gavril said, but his tone was purposely curt to let them
know he wanted no more nonsense. If we may return to the matter at hand?
Mierre bent over the crudely drawn diagram of the oldest section of the hold.
His sandy hair was thin and brittle, sticking out from beneath the edges of
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his dark green cap, which he wore tilted rakishly on one side of his head just
like Gavril did. I can try to steal a key, your highness, but there s always
a guard posted at the
That won t do, Gavril interrupted. Turning away in frustration, he flung up
his hands. What kind of miser keeps a guard posted on his own cellar? Morde a
day, but the chevard is impossible.
By now Kaltienne had his breath back. He straightened with a wince, keeping a
wary distance from Mierre. Damne, Mierre, that hurt like the devil.
You ll get worse if you don t behave.
Kaltienne snorted. Behave? Thod s teeth, but you re the one who can t behave.
When you
Mierre raised his beefy hand in menace, and Kaltienne scooted back his stool.
He shut his mouth, but deviltry still danced in his eyes.
Sighing, Mierre returned his attention to Gavril, who had begun to seethe.
Forgive me, your highness. He s forever a fool and a knave.
No, Gavril said, his tone cutting and contemptuous. Kaltienne is a child. I
¡ö
shouldn t have included him in this
Your highness! Kaltienne said loudly, horrified. He jumped off his stool to
kneel before Gavril. Forgive me. I was only jesting. I will do whatever you
ask
Gavril pointed at him and said sternly, Hold your tongue.
Kaltienne s face turned pale. He reached out as though to take Gavril s hand
in his, but Gavril drew back.
Say no more, he commanded. Listen and perhaps I will relent.
Gulping audibly, Kaltienne bowed his head and remained kneeling.
Gavril frowned at him with impatience. He was running out of time, and these
boys
were not providing the quality of help he wanted. Get on your feet, he said
angrily.
Kaltienne jumped up at once. He opened his mouth, met Gavril s angry eyes, and
closed his mouth again with a sigh.
I don t suppose your highness could just ask Lord Odfrey to return your
wine?
Mierre asked quietly.
Gavril gritted his teeth. I did. Lord Odfrey refused me.
That had been a week ago, and his voice still reverberated with his shock and
furious disappointment. No one ever refused him, the only son of the king. No
one ever denied him what he wished or asked for. Except for Lord Odfrey. At
every turn the chevard thwarted him. It was maddening. Worst of all, Lord
Odfrey had been given this authority by the king s own warrant. Thus far, one
month had passed of Gavril s required year of fostering. Already it seemed an
eternity. Thanks to the chevard s obstinance, Gavril had made no progress on
his secret quest to find the lost Chalice.
Frowning, Gavril held out his jeweled cup in silence, and his lone manservant
hurried forward to fill it. The cider was a thin, brown brew pressed from the
Thirst orchards.
Gavril considered it a peasant s drink, but Lord Odfrey was as miserly a man
as Gavril had ever encountered, worse even than the clerks in the royal
countinghouse. The chevard served naught but water or cider at his table,
except on feast-days and the king s birthday. Nor would he permit Gavril to
drink from the costly and elegant wines, or Klad beer, with its kick to the
stomach, or the honeyed mead from the Isles of Saelutia that he had brought
with him in a wagon made specially for the purpose. That wagon was now lodged
in the chevard s barn, and its sublime contents were all under lock and key
inside the chevard s own cellar.
Robbery it was, nothing less. Every time Gavril swallowed the sour, thin cider
he felt as though his throat had been scalded by his present guardian s
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thievery and discourtesy.
Gavril had been drinking wine since he was seven. It was his custom in his
father s palace to drink rounds with the guardsmen once a month on lastday.
Among the men he had the reputation for having a hard head and a hollow leg.
Therefore, he felt insulted by Lord Odfrey s assumption that he could not
command his cup or that he would hold drunken revels with the other fostered
boys in his rooms at night.
Even more important than Gavril s own luxury, however, were the kegs of fine
mead that he d intended to use as bribes. How else was he to win over the
secret support of
Lord Odfrey s knights? How else could he suborn the loyalty of the steward of
Thirst
Hold? Or persuade the cook to prepare meals of suitable quality for him alone?
Saelutian mead was an elixir of such sweetness and flavor that a single goblet
of it could make a grown man reel. Rare and costly, it was powerfully
addictive and after a few sips one s palate craved it with an evergrowing
fierceness. Using it instead of coin was a subtle ploy that appealed to
Gavril. He aspired to statecraft of great subtlety. Cardinal Noncire had [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
