At last Leeb ran out of superlatives, and after that he just sat and stared at her in blissful wonder.
She explained that she had been visiting her sister and was on her way home.
“But you’ll come and see my Pl—come and see the place?” he begged.
He wasn’t what she had ever imagined. He did not have bulgy arms and broad shoulders. He was skimpy and far from handsome. Homely at best! But she had Feeling and she had never Felt a man like him, or at least not one who felt what he did, for her. A gentle, loving boy, who laughed when he should have been angry. A boy who did not take himself seriously, but took her very seriously indeed and wanted to make her happy.
She wanted to weep. She could not bear to tell him about the College, or tell him that she must soon go away.
She shook her head.
Again he blushed. “Oh, I know we’ve just met!” he said.”I wouldn’t expect . . . Not so soon . . . I mean, all I wanted was to let you see. And think about it, of course. I don’t expect . . . that!”
She shook her head again. That wasn’t the problem at all. If he showed her this Place and it was one-tenth as good as he said it was, she was going to accept Leeb right there—bare bodies on the grass. She was sure of it. And that would never do, not when she had to go away.
But she could not bring herself to tell him the terrible truth, because then he would go out of her life forever and she thought she had found something as precious as the Place he had found, even if she could not keep it very long.
When in doubt, ask your mother. That was another of her mother’s sayings.
“Why not come to the Gaib Place and meet my parents?” she said at last.
For Leeb, that was the second-best thing she could have said. Long before evening, they were walking hand in hand.
3
Prince Holindarn of Krasnegar was having breakfast, again. He liked to have several breakfasts, to prepare him for as many lunches as he could persuade his mother to provide. If greed was the criterion, Holi was definitely impish.
Looking down at him as he sucked busily and kneaded her breasts with his tiny fists, Inos was trying to decide whether his nose was really faunish, or if that was just a normal baby nose. As usual, she decided that she neither knew nor especially cared. He would definitely do. Impish or not, he was growing like a jotunn. It was all these breakfasts.
Whatever illusions the rest of the world might have about springtime, Krasnegar knew better. The days were growing longer, but arctic winter still held the castle in its dark embrace. Yet another blizzard was howling around the castle, and once in a while the great fireplace would puff out an eye-stinging cloud of smoke. The queen was sitting with her feet almost in the hearth, her back turned to the great hall for privacy. Meanwhile the life of the palace went on around her, servants coming and going, everybody carefully pretending not to notice what her Majesty was doing.
She wondered how many reigning monarchs behaved so casually and managed to get away with it. Her parents, even, would have been shocked, and they had never been known to stand on ceremony. Queen Evanaire had certainly never nursed Princess Inosolan in public like this.
The source of all the informality was sitting beside her on the bench, facing the other way and supposedly watching what was going on at the far end of the great chamber, but once in a while sneaking admiring looks at her bodice. He was quite within his rights to do so, and she enjoyed his attention.
Rap had returned the previous day from a seal hunt—beating the blizzard to the door by about three hours—and it was wonderful to have him back. She was also glad to see that he was in a cheerful mood. Something had been bothering him ever since Winterfest. Rap was not normally a brooding type. She wished he would get it off his chest, but she was not going to pry. He would speak up when he was ready.
He hated playing monarch, but he did not look too abominably scruffy today. His jerkin was quite respectable, even if his boots were not.
“No! No! No!” a shrill voice cried from the dais. “You have to put more feeling in it! Try again!”
“You are the most beautiful woman in the whole world!” an angry boyish treble snarled.
“That’s a little better. But you still should sound more impressed.”
King and queen exchanged grins. The castle children were being rehearsed without mercy in a forthcoming dramatic presentation, The Terrible Revenge of Allena the Fair, written, directed, and produced by Princess Kadie. Starring, of course, Princess Kadie in the title role.
Amateur theatricals were an ancient Krasnegarian tradition, one of the many ways the inhabitants made merry during their long winter captivity. Dancing and madrigal singing and concerts and assorted game tournaments were others. Whether a man’s taste ran to bare-knuckle brawling or lute playing, he could always find something of interest going on.
Krasnegar held some remarkable talents, for its size. Inos could think of four or five superb singers, a juggler, two or three dancers, and a half-dozen musicians, any of whom would have won acclaim within the Impire. It had not always been so. The change could be traced back to a certain act of insanity by Inos herself, way back in . . . Gods! Where did the years go? Kadie and Gath were thirteen now, so . . .
“Why so troubled, love?” Rap said softly. “Is the little monster sucking all the life out of you?”
Holi stopped work and rolled his eyes to see where the voice had come from. Inos grabbed the chance to detach him and lay him against her shoulder. ”Hook me up, will you, love?”
“Actually,” Rap said with a gleam in his eye, “I’m much better at unhooking.”
“Then you need the practice!” she said. He sighed and fastened her bodice for her.
Inos adjusted Holi on her shoulder. “As for being troubled, I was just thinking . . . Next year will be too early for Kinvale, won’t it? Maybe the year after?”
Rap scowled. “The year 3000? Does she have to go at all?” Surprised by that response, Inos went back to first principles and reconsidered the matter. She had always assumed that Kadie must be packed off to Kinvale one of these days, as she had been, to learn decorum and Imperial manners.
How she missed Aunt Kade! It was over a year now since the dear old lady had peacefully failed to awaken one morning, her soul gone to join the Good. Aquiala had sent word through the magic portal and Inos and Rap had gone incognito to the funeral, but she still missed her dear, brave aunt. Kinvale would never be the same without her.
“I suppose we had better settle the succession first, hadn’t we?” she said. “You want Gath to succeed?”
Now it was Rap’s turn to look surprised. He glanced around to make sure no one was listening; perhaps he was considering that a commons fireplace was not the most suitable location for discussing such weighty matters. Or maybe that wouldn’t occur to him. “Is there a law?” he asked. “Kadie’s older.”
“Only by twenty minutes! Just custom—the oldest boy. It’s the Imperial way and the way Krasnegar’s always done it. Sisters get traded off for treaties, younger sons are sent to the wars to be killed, and the oldest son inherits. It’s brutal, but it stops argument. I had an older brother, you know. He died in infancy.”
“Yes, I knew that.” Rap smiled. “What a lot of bother he could have saved us if he’d lived!”
She pulled a face at him and was distracted by a contented burp from Holi. One of these days they would have to discuss the succession in the council—but Rap was still musing.
“I have trouble,” he said softly, “imagining Gath imposing his will on the kingdom!”
True, Gath was extraordinarily placid.
“On the other hand,” the king added, “it is considerably harder to imagine the kingdom ever tolerating Kadie longer than the first week.” He grinned to take the sting out of his words. “Perhaps we should send Kadie to the Imperial Military College in Hub and send Gath to Kinvale, to learn how to be a gentleman.”
“I think Gath is a born gentleman. That’s the trouble!”
“Truly. Gath ruling jotnar just doesn’t fit on the page, does it?” He sighed, no doubt thinking of the bruises and broken bones he had suffered while establishing his own right to be taken seriously as a king in Krasnegar. ”But Kadie’s a born tyrant.” He dropped his voice. “Careful. Company!”