The Lady Mehleena more than filled her chair. Although the massive piece of furniture had been constructed to seat a full-grown and armored man, it was all she could do to wedge her monstrously fat rump and meaty thighs betwixt the arms; nonetheless, she would have no other chair, for this one had been her late husband’s and, to her, it symbolized the power and privilege of the greatest noble in the duchy. Not that she deluded herself into the thought that she ever could lawfully occupy that position—for, though the stray Middle Kingdoms burklet or distant Kindred holding or tribe of mountain barbarians might be ruled by a woman, Mehleena was Ehleeneekos through and through, and the positions of women in civilized society were distinctly inferior to those of Ehleenee men.
On the silver plate before her was a two-liter bowl which formerly had been brimful with maize porridge topped with butter, cream and honey, her usual morning meal. Within the short time they had been at table, Lady Mehleena had reduced the bowl’s contents to something less than half, washing it down with long drafts of sweet, potent honey wine, the servitor behind her refilling her cup whenever it neared emptiness. But not quite all the sticky mess had gone to maintain her overample girth. Her lips and chin were gooey with it, and so was the fine silk of her clothing over the mountainous swell of her breasts.
Poking an elbow into her eldest son’s ribs, she snarled, “Sit up, you oaf! Sit straight As a soon-to be, must be, thoheeks, you must learn to make an appearance. And keep your hand off Gaios’ legs. You must learn to confine your loveplay to the privacy of your chambers. Your peers are still half-barbarian at heart. They neither can nor will understand or tolerate such; they’ll think less of you and make sport of you for your sophisticated tastes.”
Absently wiping at the bits of porridge which had sprayed over him along with his mother’s harsh-voiced words, the young man grumbled, “Mother, for all you say, you know that damned ahrkeethoheeks will never allow me to be Thoheeks of Vawn, any more than my oafish cousins will ever confirm me chief of Sanderz. They hate us one and all, you, me, or any person of the Old Race, and you know it.”
Dropping her golden spoon with a clatter, Mehleena’s fat, beringed hand lashed a backhanded slap which caught Myron full in the mouth.
“Shut up! How dare you gainsay your mother? You will be, must be, thoheeks. This land must be returned to civilized control and its people to the worship of God.
“Besides,” she smirked her satisfaction, “we have the barbarians hoist on their own hooks this time. Your brother Ahl can never be chief; the barbarians’ own laws forbid confirmation of any man who cannot lead in war. And how can a blind man do such, eh? So, since Behrl died last year you are the eldest living, uncrippled son of Hwahltuh.” Waving the line of servitors back, she lowered her voice to a harsh whisper. “As I have said before, Myron, all that is needful is that you make the proper appearance at the ahrkeethoheeks” court and play-act a little. He’ll be bound to confirm you thoheeks—which is where the power and wealth lie. Let your cousins name whomever they wish their chief. It’s just an empty title, anyway.
“Once you’re confirmed and secure back here in Vawn, we can see to setting the land and people to rights and forget the ahrkeethoheeks, the black-hearted pig. He never comes this far west, and—”
“But… but, Mother, they… they say he has eyes and ears everywhere?” Myron looked about him, squirming uneasily in his chair. “And… and for all we know, Tim could come riding in any day.”
With a scream of rage, the corpulent woman sprang up, overturning the heavy chair and, with a sweep of her arm, sending porridge bowl, plate and brimming cup smashing down the length of the table. The priest gasped a gurgling cry as a sudden lapful of hot porridge burned through the fabric of his robe to highly sensitive portions of his anatomy. Maddened with pain, he dumped an ewer of cool buttermilk atop the discomfort.
Fearing the onset of one of her cousin’s fearsome and ever more frequent rages, Neeka, too, arose and moved toward Mehleena. Behind the high-table serving area, the servitors huddled in a knot, trembling, for their lady had, on occasion when thwarted, near killed servants.
But this time their fears proved groundless, as did Neeka’s solicitude. After taking several deep breaths, Mehleena signed for the chair to be righted and the floor and table cleaned, reseated herself and resumed her conversation in an almost normal tone.
“Myron, my son, I can but thank God that womenfolk of my house are long-lived, for I can see that, for all my efforts to improve you, you are going to need someone to think for you for the rest of your life.
“Of course the ahrkeethoheeks has spies and informants in the halls of his liegemen, but Neeka knows who all of them are—every one, Myron. And we await only your confirmation to see to suitable ‘accidents’ to rid ourselves of them.
“As to the Lord of Incest, your half brother, let me assure you that as surely as we sit here at table, we are rid of him. There’s been not one word from him since we heard of that battle wherein his captain was slain and most of the officers and common sorts slaughtered. That was over five years ago, Myron. Both Neeka and I feel certain that the young swine is dead. And—”
The door at the end of the dining chamber swung open and a tall, spare man and a tiny, brown-haired woman entered. At sight of the newcomers, Myron started to rise in habitual deference, but his mother shoved him back into his chair, snarling wordlessly.
The tall man smiled wryly. “Good morning, dear stepmother. For all your preachments, I see that sweet Myron still knows his place, and, except for you, would defer to his betters.”
Rage darkening her puffy face, Mehleena made to rise, but the man languidly waved one well-kept hand, “No, no, my dearest stepmother, keep to that place… for all that it should he mine, I doubt me there’s another dining chair that is massive enough to hold the hundred kaiee you must weigh without splintering ‘neath you.” He chuckled, and his diminutive companion pealed a silvery laugh.
“Were your poor father alive,” Mehleena hissed in cold rage, “you’d not bespeak me so, you eyeless spawn of a barbarian bitch!”
But another, maddening chuckle was her only answer.
In a slow, stately advance, the couple came up the length of the room and took seats at one end of the wide table. While servitors set the places and brought food, the blind man rubbed absently at inkstains on his fingers, ran a hand over his neck-length ash-blond hair and then steepled his long fingers before remarking, “Ah, the good Father Skahbros is setting a new fashion in clerical garb, a robe bedecked with food stains rather than crusted with jewels. Most original, I must say, holy sir.” His dry chuckle came again, while the embarrassed priest hung his head.
“If all you’ve come for is to insult me and bedevil my priest, you are to quit this board!” Mehleena snapped, her voice quivering with the intensity of her hate. “I’m the lady of this hall and I’ll not have—”
The blind man’s palm smote the table with a sound like a thunderclap. All mirth had departed from his handsome face, and, when he spoke, ice shards crackled in his words.
“You will mind your words, my lady… and your manners! You forget yourself and overestimate your station. While still my father lived, you were lady of Sanderz Hall, and the years of pain and misery you brought us all were many indeed.
“But the thoheeks is gone to Wind now, his body ashes for half a year. Ahrkeethoheeks Bili of Morguhn has appointed me regent over clan and thoheeksee until it is known for certain if Tim Sanderz will return to claim his patrimony—that office and rank to which he was born.
“For the sakes of those of your children who are more like our father than like you, I have allowed—understand me, madam!—allowed you to retain the outward trappings and authority of chatelaine. But, as all save you and your creatures seem to know, you rule within your sphere only by my sufferance!
“Were my sweet sister, the Dowager Princess of Kuhmbuhluhn, amenable, she would be in your place. But for all the evil you wrought and tried to wreak against her and Tim, she would not see you debased and humbled within this hall, nor will she allow me to send you, your cousin, your pervert of a son and your priest of an illegal cult packing.