“Crown Prince Kurqosz.”
“You are a princess then?”
She laughed. “Me? A princess? To be a princess, my mother would have to be Voitik as well.” Taking him by surprise, she leaned forward and kissed him. “No, I am a slave. But of royal blood; I have slaves of my own.”
They donned furs and skis then, to explore the neighborhood, explorations that proved quite limited. Macurdy had never been on skis before, and floundered at first, Rillissa laughing and helping him. Afterward she took him to a hot tub, and began to undress. When he didn’t at once follow her example, she ordered him to, then helped him. Before they left, she’d had him on a bench. What would the Crown Prince do if he found out? Montag asked her. She told him her father had instructed her to he with him; he suspected Montag might have traits useful to the bloodline.
That confused as much as clarified. If Rillissa was a slave, how would her offspring by a foreigner become part of the royal bloodline? Or-perhaps the bloodline Kurqosz referred to was more like that of the family livestock.
28
The Palace
They left the next morning in four horse-drawn sleighs: Kurqosz and Montag with Tsulgax and Rillissa, plus guards and personal slaves. Macurdy didn’t know it, but sleighs were almost the only land conveyance that the Voitik species, the “Voitusotar,” rode in. Meanwhile they’d dressed him as prosperous humans dressed in Hithmearc, his cloak and cap of dark lustrous fur. He strutted a little in them, as a peasant boy might.
Dusk was settling when they reached a town, on the shore of a sizeable river, the Jugnal. There the snow was much less, and the river unfrozen. One wing of an inn had been prepared for the crown prince and his entourage-Montag and Rillissa shared a large feather bed-and in the morning the whole party started downstream on a pair of luxurious barges.
For four days and four nights they floated, the first day on the Jugnal, then on the mighty Rovenstarn, through sunshine, drizzle, and snow showers, carried by the current and the slow strong strokes of burly human oarsmen, past bluffs, towns, the mouths of tributaries, and the overlooking ruins of castles. Castles knocked down, according to Rillissa, by Kurqosz’s barbarian ancestors after they’d conquered these lands. Of other traffic there was little, beyond barges piled high with fuelwood, but of those there were plenty, for long peace had brought burgeoning populations. The fuelwood cutters had stripped the country increasingly bare of woods, and fuel was brought from farther and farther away, from rugged hills and mountains.
Late each day the royal barges stopped, just long enough to take on provisions and new oarsmen, then pull away again. Rillissa’s appetite for sex was remarkable. Fortunately she was aware of male limitations, and between bouts in bed, they spent breaks bundled on deck, watching the banks pass, and talking. Her German flowed more and more easily, and she recounted for Macurdy the history of the Voitusotar. They’d originated far to the north, in a land of plateaus, mountains, ice fields and fjords, a murky country wet with rain and snow, mists and fogs. The valley dwellers had herded goats and sheep, the highlanders reindeer.
Then an epizootic had nearly wiped out their reindeer, and the highland clans had migrated eastward across a vast, neararctic wilderness they called “the neck.” In all other directions the sea had blocked them, and on the sea the Voitusotar were so gripped by violent nausea, they died. River boats were the extent of their travel on water.
Nor did this tall and slender people ride animals or carriages. They became ill from the motion, though not so badly as on ships. Mostly they traveled afoot, and no human could begin to run with them. This people who’d long herded goats and reindeer in moccasins and on skis, who’d hiked a thousand leagues in their migrations, could run for days on end if need be. An ordinary Voitik male could easily outsprint a human champion. Running was bred into them, and pride in it instilled from infancy. In war they were cavalry without horses.